Friday, June 22, 2012

facing the strange ch ch changes


WARNING! There may be a lot of grammatical errors…sorry I write like I tawk.

I hope what you are about to read you are not experiencing, but if you are this info may help you or maybe someone you know…. I am on a mission so to speak, to help out my “sistas”.  

I wanted to start this blog for that reason. 

Where did I go? Who is this person living in my body?

The last 2 years I have been living in a torture chamber.  I am the only female in my family that has not had a hysterectomy… (Yea that’s where I am going with this)…I thought everything I was feeling was what we as women had to endure as part of the gender…………so I suffered, I behaved badly….very badly, to the one person on this planet that I loved the most. I felt exhausted, weak, miserable, pained and disenchanted with my life in EVERY aspect.  I was lucky if I slept 1-2 hours a night and gained weight at an alarming rate….regardless of efforts to the contrary.  

Oh, and get this….practically unemployable!

Ok, so there’s a little background….
Here is where I began to regain my sanity ..... some may argue, but...well here goes.

I belong to a Book Club, we alternate choosing the book every month and one of the gals chose “The Sexy Years”-Suzanne Somers for the March read.

I thought, Ooooh no! REALLY???!!!! 
Yea, really, so we all read it.

I was immediately taken by the fact that Miss Suzanne knew sooo much about me.  You see, I thought I was unique, I thought everything I was experiencing was normal, I never wanted Hormone Replacement Therapy, because the HRT that is available is made from pregnant mare urine and I thought it too disgusting to ever contemplate having it in my system.  I never heard of Bio-identical Hormone Replacement Therapy.  What? Natural hormones? A customized plan…..?  Aaah ha! Well I volunteered to be the guinea pig, and be the one to seek this supposed miracle…..the following is a post from my Facebook book club page to the ladies after I had gone and started the process, this was the day I thought I would be implanted.

I had posted: Today is the day I get implanted!!!!!!!!

One of the gals followed with: Well????

My response:
Well? ... Here goes, I won’t be feeling any better any time soon, for me that means a continuation of my nightmare.  Hopefully it will be 3 or so weeks if I can pull off a hat trick, maybe sooner.  I go in to see the Doc today, (a very nice and caring gentleman by the way), at 3:00 and by 3:30 I am crying and haven’t stopped since, as I type this I have to break and reach for the tissues as the tears are making my vision kind of swimmy.  So what happened…. 1st I have to have a pap and mamy which are less than 1 year old…So I have to schedule that…..once I do that then he can prescribe the bio-identical hormones and a promise that I will feel better! ….So part of my crying was that I thought I would have relief by Thurs-Fri….But alas, that is not meant to be.
The bigger issue is the extensive blood work they did revealed for me so much more, some a little scary, yet it all makes sense because I feel completely out of whack.
My main complaints are as follows, (and these are constant, never easing), I choose to share this with you because I wanted you to know my voyage through this…here goes>>>>>: joint pain, muscle weakness, mind fog (well that’s what I call it), zero or no sleep for the last 2 years, (I know, I know how can that be?)  NO ENERGY, very mooooody, super oily skin, acne (Never had these types of breakouts) weight gain, I gained yet another pound since I saw the doc a week ago Thursday. And, oh yes, weight gain when measures are taken to lose weight nothing happens.  Crying, crying, crying, crying, and more crying, no sex drive, none, zero, constant hot flashes, all night night sweats, now gums bleed.   WTF!!

So what’s wrong?? Besides being in the throes of peri menopause, my thyroid is so whacked I get to enjoy a 24 hour urine collection test before he even prescribes me anything for it.  Vitamin D is so low that it should be closer to 80 and mine is at 11. Cholesterol is THROUGH THE ROOF. Borderline diabetic, and intense inflammation in my system.  There is I think something else but I can’t quite recall it as I have brain fog and I was crying so much that in the middle of the consult he stopped, looked at me with very caring eyes and said, “You’re not hearing me any more are you Honey?” that is when I politely answered ..”No”.
My man was in the waiting room and I was so beside myself that I didn’t even consider asking him to come in and listen or at least take notes.  He came with me because we were going to go out and celebrate the implant (!) while we were in Buckhead. That didn’t happen.
I left with 2 shopping bags and a prescription. 1 bag containing the 24 hour urine test, the second, all kinds of (NATURAL) anti oxidants, liquid Vitamins D and B, cholesterol reducing stuff and an appointment in about 3 weeks.



-------Then….

Implanted with estrogen and testosterone on 5-3-12
Progesterone came on 5-9-12 taken orally at night
Starting to sleep, Yippee!

5-14-12
Starting to sleep a little more consistently,  Yay!
5-14-2012 1st time in the last 2 years I walked around the block, also the first time in 2 years I had GANA to do it, (Spanish for desire, want) didn’t think I had the force to make it uphill.….thought I wouldn’t make it at all at times, took me25 minutes, about a mile <<<that really surprised me felt like double that…walked very slowly, incredible how the body just goes to hell.

Thyroid test reveals NO IODINE in my system to fuel the thyroid…No wonder I can't loose an ounce! Geez Louise!

So where am I now, June 21st
It took about 2 and a half weeks for the hormones to start to “take” ! 
I am on a no gluten, no dairy, and no soy diet now.  I am still and will be for a while if not forever on the supplements..and the Bio Identical HRT….The following are steadily improving: energy returning, major mood change: I am kind, I sleep, I laugh, I live, I love!!

These hormones return the body to how we felt at 25-35 years of age.  Libido through the ROOF !  I cannot tell you how profusely I continue to apologize to this man, my man, that had the heart to stay with me, if things were reversed I do not believe, no…I know, I would not have been able to continue that relationship.

So like I said if you or some other woman you know is living what I lived, my nightmare, please share this, read the book (yeah…I know but really read it).  It changed my life...and his.

Stay tuned!

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