What we are eating and what's eating us. Friday!!

Hello OFFers! 

Linda - I am so sorry to hear that Olivia's meds aren't working.  Head meds are the worse to get the right med and right dosage and sometimes even the correct diagnosis.  I'll remember both of you in my prayers.  You hang in there. 

Brenda - Glad you got a day off!  You have really had a busy schedule recently and need some time for yourself.

I went to work Tuesday and Wednesday and that pretty much wiped me out for the rest of the week.  I took yesterday and today off.  Hopefully with the weekend coming up I'll get enough rest that will allow me to go back to work full time next week.  My boss is being very good about all of this.  I have been blessed with a boss who understands.  I've know him and his family since he was in kindergarten.  He used to play baseball with my son.  I went to bed last night at 9 and slept until noon today.  That says a lot ! Guess I've been trying to push myself too hard. 

B - 4 oz Protein Shake
S - 1/2 cup cream of chicken soup
L - 4 oz Protein Shake ( at 4:30 in the afternoon!)
D - Pintos and Cheese (homemade this time - don't feel like driving the 3/4 mile to Taco Bell)
S- 4 oz Protein Shake

I have managed to do my 2-mile walk away the pounds every day.  I got Richard Simmons toning tape and did that with the toning bands last night.  Didn't do the ab part.  I'll have to ask the dr about that next Friday when I go in for my 1-month visit.

Have a great Friday everyone!

Hiya Donna, I am glad you took some rest! I did not want to put ideas in your head, but I know I used to get pretty tired in the beginning. My body felt depleted every morning, like I had no extra reserves.
Are you taking vitamins and calcium? I know every doctor is different.,..smile.
Girl, we are back to thinking Olivia is NOT bi-polar. The doctors sometimes use the spaghetti test. Throw some crap on the wall and see what sticks.
Things seem to be going well for you. I am happy for you.
Hugs!

Sorry for this being so long...

LInda Sweetie Pie Honey Bunch (giggle giggle) you didn't put ideas in my head, my body made up its own mind that it was not going to function the past few days...I felt like I was in la-la land when I woke up yesterday and I knew I wouldn't be able to last.  Same for today. the only differenece was that today i did manage to stagger to the computer at 6:30 am and emailed my boss that I couldn't make it in then went back to be and slept to noon.  Now that's just my body telling me "Girlfriend you're tired and you need some more rest.!!!.  I've still managed to get in my exercises but I have to totally crash for 30-45 min afterward. 

I am so glad you mentioned the info about Olivia.  Girlfriend you just don't know the road I've been on for the past 20 years.  Diagnosed with depression - well, yes i give the drs that one and the diagnosis of GAD (Generalized Anxiety Disorder) but as time went on it always seemed the "Miricle med" they put me on would poop out on me and so I had to have another med.  Then they diagnosed me with Adult ADD, GAD, and Borderline Personality Disorder.....then after a while they changed their minds = it was not borderline personality disorder after all.  Maybe it is Bipolar where the 'manic' phases were more like what they perceived was my normal.  Sooooooooooooooo I got off of that med and onto Lamictal.  When Lamictal made me have episodes (explosive espisodes I might add of anger) the cure was to put me on more of the same med or add back my Lexapro which I had begged them to do for months.  Around this time I had my sleep study.  I was on Strattera for the Adult ADD, Lexapro for Depression, Lamictal for bipolar, and tranxene for restless leg syndrome and anxiety.  My pulmonary dr told me that he thought most of my problems would go away with cpap treatment and that they were caused by sleep depravation all these years.  Guess what?  He was right.  I am now off the Strattera and Lamictal.  Seems 25+ years of sleep depravation was my problem all along.  Plus the fact that I was not going into REM sleep was really screwing me up.  Not going into REM sleep was making already bad sleep worse and some of the meds I was on contributed to my lack of REM sleep. 

Thankfully now I am on what I feel are the right meds for the right problems.  Lexapro 20 mg in the morning, Amitryptaline 25 mg at night to get me to REM sleep, Ambien 10 mg to help me get to sleep at all and occasionaly Tranxene 7.5 for Restless Leg Syndrome.  Honestly I mostly take 1/2 of the Ambien and 1/2 of the Tranxene - depends on how I feel.  I was beginning to feel with all the meds they had me on that they were giving me meds to get me up in the morning and meds to get me down at night.  Of course my psychiatrist was livid when I told her which meds I had stopped taking but quite frankly I didn't and still don't care how she reacted.  I know how I felt and I knew what my pulmonary dr had said and I gave it a shot.  Before surgery I had completely stopped the Tranxene but now I'm in that just had surgery phase where my sleep is still whacky.  It should straighten out in the next week or so and I'll be able to stop the Tranxene again.

Ok, the point to all of this is Olivia (and you) have to stand up to the doctors and get them to take a good long look at her history.  They AIN'T always right.  Especially if there are several doctors prescribing her meds.  They all want to be the one with the correct course of treatment.  But most importantly of all, Olivia needs to take responsiblity for her mental health care and be honest with you, the doctors, and mostly herself so she can get on the path to recovery.  She's got to want it.  When I finally got a (excuse me) KISS MY A$$ THIS IS MY LIFE ATTITUDE, doctors started listening to me and working with me instead of working for their egos.

Just my $1.25 worth. 

Love you and pray for you and your family.    ((((((((hugs))))))))  XXXXXXXX OOOOOOOO

Yep!That lamictal crap sucks.I take 100mg of amptripline (elavil) to sleep and to help with the face spasms I had that they never really found out exactly what it was!!! I went from 20 to 100 mg because it helps me, and my doctor rocks! I take 300 mil of wellbuturin during the day, and a bunch of stuff including klonopin for anxiety as needed. I did not have apnea, but did have low REM.
I have not slept in my bed in a year now because my body hurts! I am going to try some pillowy toppings after going through the memory foam garbage.
At one point I was on Oxycotin, God save us all, 80 mgs twice a day, can we say "feel like a dope addict"????
I do take narco which is vicodin, so I can walk and go to work. This wa**** and miss, as they had me on 13, 300 mgs of Neurotin, courtesy of the pain center.
That is when I gained 10 pounds, found OFF and started our thread.
I take half the blood pressure med I used to, and only at night, as it puts me to sleep too.
I know what you are saying, and after all my battle scars, it is as Abe Lincoln said, "Most people are as happy as they make up their minds to be".

Oh yeah, then there was Lyrica, which gave me the only seizure I have ever had in my life.

I am like screw you doctors, You work for ME. Give me the old tried and true stuff.

I use a walker, for I do have a bad knee, which I could have replaced, but since it hurts all the way up to my hip, why bother. I can sometimes walk alone, but not a great distance.

I talked to my doctor about addiction, which I have never felt with the vicotin,we are all wired differently. So after the neurologist, and the pain center, they all sent me back to my doctor whom I love. She said, you are 57 years old, I would not worry about addiction as you will always be taking a pain med the rest of your life. Of course now it all falls into that big pot called fibromalsia, excuse my spelling, but you know what I mean.
I use Dial a Ride, they pick me up for work and anywhere else I need to go, and go I do, to work 5 days a week...smile.
I think about when I was almost 500 pounds (some thanks to steroids for 3 years) a lot from soothing myself with food, knocking myself out so I could at least have a stupor like sleep.
I use to curl into a ball of fat, and sleep, so full, so sad, and promising myself a better tomorrow.
I do not know what to do about Olivia, I love her dearly, and I am not about to walk away from my grands, their dads already did that. We live about 30 feet from each other in townhouses, which I moved to after th 3rd hubby. The first one died, and   with the other two. I am much better off than I used to be in many ways. I will not even eat if I am upset.

Am I happy?? Not all the time, I do not think I am supposed to be, I think I am here to learn, but I do have some happiness. Am I a survivor?? H3LL YEAH!! 
I can see you are too!
...Blessed be.