Dreamer Easy

I HAD AN INJECTION

and I neither died not freaked out!

Admittedly, the Valium helped. And it was only intramuscular B12. BUT STILL. First shot I've had since 1995.

My B12's actually not terrible now, but a squirt of the stuff every few months will make sure it stays OK. My iron's heaps better and my vitamin D is fine. My cholesterol is up lots, though, which is just what you'd expect when you suddenly stop taking a cholesterol-lowering drug like Questran. Dr K has given me a cholesterol-lowering drug to try out.

My blood sugars are still rubbish - 15.5 after breakfast ffs, hb1Ac 9.0 ffs ffs. Off to the endocrinologist we go. GIMME THE INSULIN, DOC, I CAN TAKE ANYTHING. Except oral erythromycin.

Off my freakin trolley on purple Xanax. normal service will etc

Xmas with the family was brilliant, but stress and a sleepless night in horrid heat discombobulated me completely! It wasn't until we were packing yesterday morning to leave my brother and sister-in-law's place that I found my weekly pill container and realised I hadn't taken my morning meds for two days straight, including one of my diabetes meds - which is why my vision was blurred enough to answer the Buzz question "Which rock star appeared on the cover of Sergeant Pepper?" with "George Clinton". D'OH D: Back on the tablets now, of course, and just in time to avoid Zoloft withdrawal. (And testing blood glucose religiously.)

This is so weird. I'm pretty sure this is the first day in 23 years that I haven't taken any Questran at all. I keep remembering to take it, then remembering not to. But so far, the OTC drugz I've substituted seem to be working fine - just one Immodium and one Colofac this morning. Blimey! Early days yet, but I'm full of hope instead of bile acid sequestrant. :)

Oh dear, I think I'm hypomanic, and we're watching Warriors Gate. I just delivered a two or three minute largely incoherent speech about randomness. Chaos Theory! Chaos Magic! Quantum forces operating on a macro scale! Altered Walter! Cross Purposes! Donald Duck in Mathemagic Land!

Oh no, Frankalike is back, mewing at the door. In a moment Tim will be enormous.

ETA: To get a sense of my current mental state, go to this page with illustrations of the Egyptian afterlife. If you cannot stop laughing at the pictures, you're where am I now.

In between catastrophising about my obviously imminent demise, I've been reading up on the vitamins and minerals I'm lacking, and I have a rather embarrassing suspicion that in fact my diet is deficient in them. It's been a long time since I thought about my nutrition in any other way than "Is this low GI and low fat?", and I'd just assumed that guzzling supplements would cover any gaps.

I knew a bit about B12, which is the bugbear of vegetarians. It's absorbed in the same bit of the small intestine that's supposed to absorb bile salts (aka bile acids), the terminal ileum. I don't absorb these properly, so it's not unreasonable to assume I'd also be having trouble absorbing B12. Might need shots or something to get around this.

I've been Googling up a crash course on iron and vitamin D - neither of which are absorbed in the terminal ileum. The Recommended Daily Intake for iron for a woman of my age is 18 mg. I may need more because of my menorrhagia. If I absorb every bit of the iron in my supplements, I'm still only getting 15 mg. Plus - and if I ever knew this, I'd forgotten it - the type of iron found in animal flesh, haeme iron, is more readily absorbed by the body than the type of iron found in vegetables (eggs, too, and my supplements). Luckily I'm actually pescan, rather than properly vegetarian, so I can get more iron by eating more fish and prawns. Should try some clams and oysters, too. Plus taking vitamin C at the same time improves absorption. I'm investigating which are the best sources of vege iron.

As for vitamin D, the doc's got me on 3000 IU a day - if that builds up my reserves, then we know it's not a malabsorption problem. Plus I'm trying to get 10 minutes of sunlight a day, to give my body a chance to make its own supply.

Think I'd better go see the dietician again, too. I've started keeping a food diary again for this purpose.

(Good grief, there's a lot of bs online about nutrition! The above notes come from reliable sources, like guvmint info sheets, and I've been comparing what different sources have to say and checking some of the science in pubmed. It helps me enormously to blog about it - helps me remember and plan.)

ETA: My path results say that metformin, one of the drugs I take for my diabetes, can be involved in B12 deficiency. Verrry interesting. Also, Questran, which I take for the bile acid malabsorption, can cause vitamin D deficiency. Verrrrrry interesting.

(What a ridiculous facial expression. I suppose I'm trying to convey a sort of philosophical acceptance. Frankly it looks more like embarrassment.)



Start the day with a good breakfast and plenty of drugs, that's what I say!

Well, it was nice while it lasted.

My new vigour and glee burst like a soap bubble on the weekend. Actually, I still have more energy than previously, because the Aropax isn't making me sleepy all the time, so I was able to get some writing done, at least; but my mood has collapsed and I physically cannot get out the front door to get to the gym.

I've left a message for the shrink to call me tomorrow; I'm praying it's just a matter of adjusting the dosage.

This is kind of what the last fews days have been like. Apparently it was mixing the Aropax with the Zoloft that did it. Sadly, now I've completely changed over to the latter, I'm no longer happy and safe in Cloudcuckooland. On the plus side, nor am I desperately sleepy, so it looks like Zoloft doesn't have that life-disrupting side effect. But does it have an effect? Only way to tell is to see whether I plunge into hideous depression over the next week or so.

Zoloft! Makes you drunk ad a skunk in a funk.

Oooh, also kind of nasuteaed.