Hooray for me! I had my annual exam yesterday and my weight is nice and steady, but higher than it was, say, a year ago. I'm fine with it, or making peace with it at the least. It's just a number (much like age).
Anyhow, there was a tiny problem with one of my tests, so my clinician called me and gave me a few numbers over the phone, one of them being my blood sugar (80) and the other that my thyroid was just right. She didn't check my cholesterol because my numbers from last year were excellent (both kinds), and my blood pressure is the lowest it's ever been in my adult life.
Seriously, I'm in good shape, as far as blood work and blood pressure. I love having numbers like these to keep me grounded - because everywhere you turn people are telling you that you cannot have both body fat and good numbers. My BMI might be over 25, but there is no indication that my weight is adversely effecting my health.
One part of my weight gain is a new medication I'm taking to help stabilize my mood. I've not gained a lot, but some, and I feel like it's a trade off that is totally worth making (A great blog post on this very subject is here). Some psychiatric drugs really adversely effect people causing massive weight gain and blood sugar problems in a short amount of time. Because of the problems with these drugs (which really should be either taken off the market or heavily restricted), I went for an older less trendy drug, and it seems to be doing a great job without too many side effects.
I'm happy with that.
Showing posts with label meds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label meds. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Paraphrase
So events and an unsuccessful attempt to adjust medication dosage conspired to keep me up all night the other evening, and I was lucky lucky lucky enough to have a night owl/early bird on the line with me to keep the crazies at bay. We had some good talk about many things and one thing I keep coming back to is the idea of what I need in my life in the order of other people.
Now this is something I've struggled with for a long time, and I don't expect I'll stop struggling with it any time soon.
The gist of the conversation was about needing a partner, and how I NEED a partner. I'm not one of those people who can go it alone. I do go it alone, I have, and I will, if that's how the chips fall, but I don't WANT to.
I WANT to be in partnership. At least, that's what I think I want. At the same time, I find it outrageously difficult to be expected to trust anyone else to do anything properly, or in my best interest, or when I need them to... Basically, I don't believe people will do what they say they will when they say they will. Which can tend to make it hard for me to relinquish my control over things.
Oddly, in romantic relationships, I usually relinquish most of the control in an effort to become more appealing. Guess what? Doesn't appear to work! I know, surprising. Who, as they say, would have thunk it?
So who knows? I guess what I am saying is that I've decided that needing what I need isn't the culprit, it's accepting less. Because less is never ever gonna be enough.
Now this is something I've struggled with for a long time, and I don't expect I'll stop struggling with it any time soon.
The gist of the conversation was about needing a partner, and how I NEED a partner. I'm not one of those people who can go it alone. I do go it alone, I have, and I will, if that's how the chips fall, but I don't WANT to.
I WANT to be in partnership. At least, that's what I think I want. At the same time, I find it outrageously difficult to be expected to trust anyone else to do anything properly, or in my best interest, or when I need them to... Basically, I don't believe people will do what they say they will when they say they will. Which can tend to make it hard for me to relinquish my control over things.
Oddly, in romantic relationships, I usually relinquish most of the control in an effort to become more appealing. Guess what? Doesn't appear to work! I know, surprising. Who, as they say, would have thunk it?
So who knows? I guess what I am saying is that I've decided that needing what I need isn't the culprit, it's accepting less. Because less is never ever gonna be enough.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
I'm a hypocrite
It was a smack in the face, but I realized this when I woke up (after I had weighed myself):
As much as I say I am not in favour of Weight Loss Dieting, that's exactly what I'm doing right now. Sort of (I will qualify this to death if I let myself).
I'm still adamant that what I am trying to do is be happier, and losing a bit of weight is part of what I see helping me get there. Not the only thing, and definitely not the main thing, but part of a set of things I want to change in my life.
I've just been prescribed a drug to manage my moods and anxiety, and that drug is known for causing weight loss as a side effect. I looked it up yesterday and found a lot of interesting information about it, such as it's uses off label by "weight loss" doctors (i.e. Quacks) and others as a diet drug. That was disturbing to say the least, as the drug has a handful of other very unpleasant side effects that are only worth the risk to me because of my struggles - I want to find stability (part of the being happier equation).
The funny thing is that if I stopped tracking my food and limited my calorie intake purposefully, but this drug just "happened" to make me lose weight anyhow, I'd still be cool in the FA community. But because I wanna lose weight (YES, DAMN IT, I DO. OKAY? Sorry), I'm a potential outcast.
Nevermind that I have been talking to people (including my health care providers*) about Health at Every size and other stuff, identifying myself as an Anti-Weight-Loss-Diet person and generally living FA (for everyone Except me, lol). Or that I will talk about my fat and tell people how much I weigh - 206 at 5'8". The fact that I have identified purposeful weight loss as a goal makes me less credible (or destroys my credibility completely) as part of the Fat Acceptance community.
At least to some.
To me, I'm a fat accepter as I am a feminist. With small fs, and to my own standards.
That's how it gonna be and how it's gotta be. But I thought acknowledging that yes, I have altered my eating to lose weight was important. I don't want to pretend that I'm not out to lose. I still plan to be "overweight" when I stop tracking, just less so.
And in the end, that's my damn business. It's my body, and I'm the only one who has got to live in it.
* Okay, so I've got this nurse I see for meds appointments, and she is hung up on weight and weight loss. She is an average size person, maybe slightly fat (honestly, I don't know). But when telling me about this new drug, she emphasized the weight loss side effect and said that a client of hers had lost 30 lbs, which set me off into a "That's not healthy" thing, and she go all defensive and said "well, she needed to lose 30 lbs," and I said, "It's still not healthy to lose that much in a month - most of that had to be water weight or something from changing medications." - we went around in a funny circle of her being sure it was FINE and me being certain if it happened to me I'd be in the doctor's office getting blood work done. Finally I told her that I didn't like to hear about weightloss and dieting things because I found it to be both depressing and I wanted to concentrate on health. She's always rubbed me the wrong way a bit, and that kind of thing doesn't help. Maybe one day she'll tell me she's read Gina Kolata's book (ooh, I should pick it up for her in paperback!), or just leave it out. It's weird because she's a psychiatric nurse. She doesn't even know what I weigh. Damn it. I should write her a letter.
As much as I say I am not in favour of Weight Loss Dieting, that's exactly what I'm doing right now. Sort of (I will qualify this to death if I let myself).
I'm still adamant that what I am trying to do is be happier, and losing a bit of weight is part of what I see helping me get there. Not the only thing, and definitely not the main thing, but part of a set of things I want to change in my life.
I've just been prescribed a drug to manage my moods and anxiety, and that drug is known for causing weight loss as a side effect. I looked it up yesterday and found a lot of interesting information about it, such as it's uses off label by "weight loss" doctors (i.e. Quacks) and others as a diet drug. That was disturbing to say the least, as the drug has a handful of other very unpleasant side effects that are only worth the risk to me because of my struggles - I want to find stability (part of the being happier equation).
The funny thing is that if I stopped tracking my food and limited my calorie intake purposefully, but this drug just "happened" to make me lose weight anyhow, I'd still be cool in the FA community. But because I wanna lose weight (YES, DAMN IT, I DO. OKAY? Sorry), I'm a potential outcast.
Nevermind that I have been talking to people (including my health care providers*) about Health at Every size and other stuff, identifying myself as an Anti-Weight-Loss-Diet person and generally living FA (for everyone Except me, lol). Or that I will talk about my fat and tell people how much I weigh - 206 at 5'8". The fact that I have identified purposeful weight loss as a goal makes me less credible (or destroys my credibility completely) as part of the Fat Acceptance community.
At least to some.
To me, I'm a fat accepter as I am a feminist. With small fs, and to my own standards.
That's how it gonna be and how it's gotta be. But I thought acknowledging that yes, I have altered my eating to lose weight was important. I don't want to pretend that I'm not out to lose. I still plan to be "overweight" when I stop tracking, just less so.
And in the end, that's my damn business. It's my body, and I'm the only one who has got to live in it.
* Okay, so I've got this nurse I see for meds appointments, and she is hung up on weight and weight loss. She is an average size person, maybe slightly fat (honestly, I don't know). But when telling me about this new drug, she emphasized the weight loss side effect and said that a client of hers had lost 30 lbs, which set me off into a "That's not healthy" thing, and she go all defensive and said "well, she needed to lose 30 lbs," and I said, "It's still not healthy to lose that much in a month - most of that had to be water weight or something from changing medications." - we went around in a funny circle of her being sure it was FINE and me being certain if it happened to me I'd be in the doctor's office getting blood work done. Finally I told her that I didn't like to hear about weightloss and dieting things because I found it to be both depressing and I wanted to concentrate on health. She's always rubbed me the wrong way a bit, and that kind of thing doesn't help. Maybe one day she'll tell me she's read Gina Kolata's book (ooh, I should pick it up for her in paperback!), or just leave it out. It's weird because she's a psychiatric nurse. She doesn't even know what I weigh. Damn it. I should write her a letter.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Side Effects, possible
So I don't know what to think.
My new meds coincided with a new ability to concentrate on reading for closer to 10 minutes up from 5. That seems to be a direct correlation, but I have to admit my *general* ability to concentrate hasn't risen across the board.
My new meds were started at the same time as my menstrual period too, so perhaps my increased energy and bounciness are related not to the medication but to hormonal changes.
My new meds have seemed (that is, I cannot find another cause, so I am seeing this as a causal relationship) to precipitate my becoming VERY CHATTY with strangers. I mean striking up wacky conversations on the bus. WTF is that about? I am not usually a chatter in that manner. It's almost a compulsive feeling.
Weird.
And lastly, I am having some worry that I am getting increased energy but still feeling pretty down, and also impulsive. I want to spend lots of money. This could well be attributed to the Capitalist/Consumer culture value of shopping as therapy. It's not as though that is way out of hand. I always think of out of hand spending as something an old coworker told me when describing her mania shopping: "a gross of ball point pens" or a "case of paper towels" just because she NEEDED those things.
Because I am still unemployed, I can agonize over every purchase (food and good beer are easier to deal with). But when I *want* something, I usually find the will power to not get it, if I don't need it.
It's hard to tell with me, what's related to my personality, my bipolar, my meds, or normal changes in mood. Since I've basically stopped therapy I am not being checked in with on the same level, but as it had not really been good (except when she told me something I was doing in one of my relationships was passive agressive, that was really helpful). So I feel that stopping therapy was self-care (as my therapist encouraged me to recognize such things and take action on them when I could).
Isn't it ironic?
Anyhow, I am feeling as though my lack of people to talk about certain things with is difficult, but I don't feel as sad as I did before. Maybe I'm meant to be floating around, directionless, with few to talk to. Maybe this is my life.
My new meds coincided with a new ability to concentrate on reading for closer to 10 minutes up from 5. That seems to be a direct correlation, but I have to admit my *general* ability to concentrate hasn't risen across the board.
My new meds were started at the same time as my menstrual period too, so perhaps my increased energy and bounciness are related not to the medication but to hormonal changes.
My new meds have seemed (that is, I cannot find another cause, so I am seeing this as a causal relationship) to precipitate my becoming VERY CHATTY with strangers. I mean striking up wacky conversations on the bus. WTF is that about? I am not usually a chatter in that manner. It's almost a compulsive feeling.
Weird.
And lastly, I am having some worry that I am getting increased energy but still feeling pretty down, and also impulsive. I want to spend lots of money. This could well be attributed to the Capitalist/Consumer culture value of shopping as therapy. It's not as though that is way out of hand. I always think of out of hand spending as something an old coworker told me when describing her mania shopping: "a gross of ball point pens" or a "case of paper towels" just because she NEEDED those things.
Because I am still unemployed, I can agonize over every purchase (food and good beer are easier to deal with). But when I *want* something, I usually find the will power to not get it, if I don't need it.
It's hard to tell with me, what's related to my personality, my bipolar, my meds, or normal changes in mood. Since I've basically stopped therapy I am not being checked in with on the same level, but as it had not really been good (except when she told me something I was doing in one of my relationships was passive agressive, that was really helpful). So I feel that stopping therapy was self-care (as my therapist encouraged me to recognize such things and take action on them when I could).
Isn't it ironic?
Anyhow, I am feeling as though my lack of people to talk about certain things with is difficult, but I don't feel as sad as I did before. Maybe I'm meant to be floating around, directionless, with few to talk to. Maybe this is my life.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
More anger from the bi polar nation
Ugh.
This has been a frustrating week (damn, it's only Tuesday). Yesterday I had a "hangover" from my meds and couldn't concentrate - words were hard to come by when my professor was speaking to me in Spanish, and I finally had to say "sorry, not today" - luckily it was only a side conversation, not during the test! But I have NO idea how I did on the exam either.
Last night I was supposed to up the meds, and because of the hangover effect I felt, I decided to take them a few hours before bedtime. Which resulted in me not being able to get out of bed to tuck the little one in, not being able to get into my pyjamas and generally being very disoriented. It was not so bad that the 8 year old was scared, but I was pretty confused for still being lucid.
I emailed bf in the midst of this and reading it this morning see it was not even a full sentence and had a couple of misspellings. He seemed to be amused by that, and I was angry at his apparent amusement at my genuine disorientation, so now that's a snarly situation. Sigh.
And people wonder why folks don't take their meds?
So I'm a bit worn out this morning and sad, but at least I can stand up and think fairly clearly. I'm going back down to 1/4 dose for now. Calling my clinician is useless because all they ever say are things like "the side effects will get better after a week or so", and "Call me if your kneecaps fall off". So I will soldier on for the rest of the week and see if I can't make it through this initial period of confusion, tired and disorientation, kneecaps intact.
This has been a frustrating week (damn, it's only Tuesday). Yesterday I had a "hangover" from my meds and couldn't concentrate - words were hard to come by when my professor was speaking to me in Spanish, and I finally had to say "sorry, not today" - luckily it was only a side conversation, not during the test! But I have NO idea how I did on the exam either.
Last night I was supposed to up the meds, and because of the hangover effect I felt, I decided to take them a few hours before bedtime. Which resulted in me not being able to get out of bed to tuck the little one in, not being able to get into my pyjamas and generally being very disoriented. It was not so bad that the 8 year old was scared, but I was pretty confused for still being lucid.
I emailed bf in the midst of this and reading it this morning see it was not even a full sentence and had a couple of misspellings. He seemed to be amused by that, and I was angry at his apparent amusement at my genuine disorientation, so now that's a snarly situation. Sigh.
And people wonder why folks don't take their meds?
So I'm a bit worn out this morning and sad, but at least I can stand up and think fairly clearly. I'm going back down to 1/4 dose for now. Calling my clinician is useless because all they ever say are things like "the side effects will get better after a week or so", and "Call me if your kneecaps fall off". So I will soldier on for the rest of the week and see if I can't make it through this initial period of confusion, tired and disorientation, kneecaps intact.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Clarity
Okay. I would like to tell you something about bipolar disorder.
IT TOTALLY SUCKS.
I guess I say that tonight because I am at this point of no longer trusting an energetic period or a good mood. I see them as threats, because maybe it means I'm gonna go all hypomanic and not be able to sleep properly for a week.
Maybe I'll get tons of energy to start 4 new projects but run out of steam before finishing any of them. Maybe I'll get really enthusiatic about a new friend, or group, or about bf or the boys, and I'll get really disappointed when nothing happens the way I've imagined it to happen.
And then, maybe, after a week or two of this high energy, I will suddenly realize that I am a horrible person who should not ever talk to another human being again.
The SWINGS of mood are really tough. Not only on me, but on my kids and my guy.
But they are devastating on friendships and socializing, which leads to more isolation, which allows the down periods to feel even worse.
The other thing which is tough is the medication part. I cant get an anti-depressant until I've tried the mood stabilizer (there is a small amount of evidence that they are not very effective for treating bipolar disorder anyhow). It's hard because I cannot seem to find relief from depression when I take mood stabilizers, so I am staying depressed even while medicated. It's hard because "depression" is a temporary state for most people, but seems to be different for me. And since drug companies and public health campaigns repeat that depression is temporary (which it is for most people), I look like a malingerer.
Bipolar disorder is also sucking more because for whatever reason (I happen to think it's a pretty even combination of life experience and growing older) my moods are less stable these days. A higher percentage of people with bipolar disorder kill themselves, and I think I get why. Right now the seeming inevitability of the swings is very discouraging to me. Losing trust in good feelings and high energy moments makes me feel as though I'm watching myself for a "wrong move" all of the time. No rest for the weary.
I can't sleep tonight and can't concentrate on anything for very long and I need something but I don't know what and food seems good but I'm not hungry. Too bad I don't smoke, right? I'm glad I don't, I'm really glad my building is non-smoking, or I would probably take it up again to keep busy.
How much more rambling can I do? That remains to be seen, because I'm signing off for the time being.
IT TOTALLY SUCKS.
I guess I say that tonight because I am at this point of no longer trusting an energetic period or a good mood. I see them as threats, because maybe it means I'm gonna go all hypomanic and not be able to sleep properly for a week.
Maybe I'll get tons of energy to start 4 new projects but run out of steam before finishing any of them. Maybe I'll get really enthusiatic about a new friend, or group, or about bf or the boys, and I'll get really disappointed when nothing happens the way I've imagined it to happen.
And then, maybe, after a week or two of this high energy, I will suddenly realize that I am a horrible person who should not ever talk to another human being again.
The SWINGS of mood are really tough. Not only on me, but on my kids and my guy.
But they are devastating on friendships and socializing, which leads to more isolation, which allows the down periods to feel even worse.
The other thing which is tough is the medication part. I cant get an anti-depressant until I've tried the mood stabilizer (there is a small amount of evidence that they are not very effective for treating bipolar disorder anyhow). It's hard because I cannot seem to find relief from depression when I take mood stabilizers, so I am staying depressed even while medicated. It's hard because "depression" is a temporary state for most people, but seems to be different for me. And since drug companies and public health campaigns repeat that depression is temporary (which it is for most people), I look like a malingerer.
Bipolar disorder is also sucking more because for whatever reason (I happen to think it's a pretty even combination of life experience and growing older) my moods are less stable these days. A higher percentage of people with bipolar disorder kill themselves, and I think I get why. Right now the seeming inevitability of the swings is very discouraging to me. Losing trust in good feelings and high energy moments makes me feel as though I'm watching myself for a "wrong move" all of the time. No rest for the weary.
I can't sleep tonight and can't concentrate on anything for very long and I need something but I don't know what and food seems good but I'm not hungry. Too bad I don't smoke, right? I'm glad I don't, I'm really glad my building is non-smoking, or I would probably take it up again to keep busy.
How much more rambling can I do? That remains to be seen, because I'm signing off for the time being.
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