I'm tired. I'm tired in ways I've never felt tired before. It feels like my bones are tired. My muscles are tired. My brain is tired. My mind is tired. I keep telling myself that if I just try hard enough, I can reverse this or stop it. I berate myself in my mind, telling myself to get up and feel better. Man up Lana, push through and go do something fun and productive. I beg my body and it resists. My body reminds me of an insubordinate toddler that will not do what you want it to do. You desperately need to be somewhere and the child just WON'T go. When you try to pull them off the ground, they take all their weight and push into the floor. You need to get their shoes on and they lock their knees, flex their foot and then wiggle away from you. You are not getting their foot in that shoe until they agree to do so. I long for my body to just agree to do so. Maybe, just as with a toddler, it's going to take patience, rest, understanding and work.
My body has not been holding onto minerals, vitamins and nutrients. It was a strange mystery until I got the diagnosis. I guess the stupid little buggers like to feed on those things, in the meantime, it stops me from storing them . Some of these are magnesium, Vitamin D, and iron. I take supplements religiously and hope that this will begin to build up and make me feel better. So far, the magnesium has only raised a small amount and the iron has continued to decline. The powdered magnesium I take makes my morning beverage smell nauseating. I try to ignore it and gulp. I have a full cardiac work-up Monday and more blood tests tomorrow. My hope is that the cardiac work-up will reveal that the heart murmur is due to the iron deficiency and not due to damage done by the disease having done damage to my heart. Apparently Lyme dismantles your immune system, which explains why I have been sick over and over again the last year. I was trying to remember when I started feeling sick this time. I couldn't remember the last time I felt really good. I was ill with what seemed to be an Upper Respiratory Infection from Halloween to February. No matter what medication they gave me, it would just resurface within days if it left at all. I put on my third annual "Dog-o-ween" dog costume party on Halloween and then went in my Dorothy costume to the school in Seaside where I met with one of the kids I volunteer for through Griefbuster's. I had a really strange episode at the school. I felt really nauseous and broke out into a weird clammy sweat. I was getting sharp shooting pains through my head and chest and glads swelled up. I felt so sick that I went straight to Doctor's on duty before going home. I was less than thrilled to find out that I would need a shot for inflammation in my butt. Even less thrilled than that to see that it would be from a from a male nurse... while wearing this outfit. I have a weird OCD compulsion where I have to match my underwear to my scrubs or clothing, so I was wearing blue and white lace panties under the little outfit. Something just felt wrong about having him lift my skirt. Like I should ask him for a tip, or look for a video camera.
This day started months of sickness. I just couldn't get better. I'd feel better for a few days and then be completely sick again. I stayed sick like this through Valentine's day. My neck and back pain was getting more and more chronic during this whole time as well. Then the abdominal cramps came back, the excessive bleeding returned and I felt dread about going in to see my gynecologist. I knew in my heart what was happening. That's when I found out my tumors were back. I just couldn't shake this feeling that something was really wrong in my body. Something under all of this other stuff. I couldn't believe that my body could be doing all this crazy, abnormal stuff without a tangible reason. But, the only answers I ever got were for "idiopathic" reasons and most likely hormone imbalance. That did not sit well with me. I knew on a deep level something more serious was wrong. As the days passed I was having trouble keeping up with my life. I've always been able to push through pain, work even if I'm sick, keep really crazy busy schedules and mangage it all. But, it was getting harder and harder. I was collapsing. And, then just before I was going to go in for my hysterectomy, I collapsed.
Now, I have these answers and am happy about that, but the medications make me feel sicker and the dumb thing is that it is still progressing. Seemingly I have lots of time to rest, but it takes so much energy to be sick that I am always tired in spite it. Looking back, I truly can't remember the last time in my life when I had a day that I was pain free. I really can't. Today, I am just sick of being sick.
I feel guilty even bitching about any of this, because there are people out there much sicker than I am and going through much worse circumstance than I am. I can do this. But, maybe I just needed to vent a little. I sound like a whiner. A friend told me once that whining is just anger coming out of a really small hole. Thinking of this made me laugh. And, I bet people would agree that I don't have a little mouth. Anyway, I hope I'm not angry. I'm glad to be laughing instead of lamenting over my silly struggle. That's a good way to end this entry.
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