What's Been Happening Lately

Not Much.

A quote from Monty Python's Search for the Holy Grail:

 A year passed: winter changed into spring, spring changed into summer, summer changed back into winter, and winter gave spring and summer a miss and went straight on into autumn... until one day...I woke up and realized it was the start of October already.  Ok, it hasn't been a year since I wrote anything, but it sure feels like it.

When we last left my saga, I was waiting for an appointment with Mandy and the Well Woman clinic.  I was lucky and able to get in to see her two weeks earlier than expected, September 23.  Carl went with me and we were both impressed by the amount of time she spent with us and the thoroughness of the exam.  I was sent in for more blood testing since my saliva tests came back with some puzzling numbers.  Five more vials of blood were drawn and some of the results have come back in, though there are still three more we are waiting on.

Tidal Wave and Bubblegum petunias in the driveway

Preliminary results from the labs which have come trickling in are also confusing; all I can do is wait for NP Mandy to sort this out when she has all the evidence.  Mike, the nurse practitioner at the lab where my blood work is drawn has been calling me whenever a new test result comes in which has been very helpful.  At least I know things weren't lost in the shuffle.  It's hard to wait for answers when you don't feel well, but this way I know that NP Mandy hasn't forgotten about me and I don't obsess.  As much.

Mandy did prescribe bioidentical hormone replacement therapy and vitamin supplements for me and I can honestly say I do feel 75% better than I did a week ago.  My headache is down to a dull roar from the screaming freight train it had been.  My energy levels aren't great, my joints are very sore and I still do get a bit weak and dizzy at times, but I'm not crying uncontrollably any more.  That's a plus, right?  (Carl thinks so.) 

Ernie the Urn, lookin' good

I haven't accomplished a thing in the last month and a half to write home about.  Sure, I go through the motions, making meals and washing dishes and clothes and all that stuff, but it's been a bare minimum.  I give the house a lick and a promise to do better next time and that's it.  I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.  I suspect my meds for thyroid are still too low, judging by the numbers I've seen on the labs.

I have been visiting websites for fellow thyroid patients and have learned a great deal from them by posting my lab results anonymously.  Of course, this is no substitute for medical advice, but the people on the forums are knowledgeable about thyroid disease because they live with it too.  I admit I've frequented several forums of thyroid patients ever since we've had access to the internet a good ten years ago and though it was comforting to meet and read about other people's battles with the disease, I eventually strayed away.

Do you wanna know why?  Because I was frustrated and jealous.  Yes, that's right.  I was jealous of people I didn't even know who were receiving adequate treatment for their thyroid diseases that I was not able to get no matter what I did.  People on the forums often urged 'You have to be your own advocate, find a good doctor and most of all, don't take no for an answer.'

Um, yeah....good idea which got me 'fired' by a doctor or three over the years.  And the worst part is you still have to pay the doctor bill even if they don't help you one iota.

That's why I gave up trying to get anywhere for the last few years. I knew I wasn't getting the tests run that should have been done, but if a doctor refuses to order them, what can you do?  It's too expensive to go doctor shopping; appointments that lead to more dead ends are costly.  I simply stuck my head in the sand, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.  I accepted my plight and took whatever prescription was handed me and dutifully had it filled at the pharmacy.   So what if I still felt ill.  Learn to live with it and hope it doesn't get worse.

Until it does. 

And then I'd go back to the doctor's office and ask for help only to be told my thyroid is not the problem since I'm 'optimally treated' and I'd beg to differ and then off we go with another round of chastisement from another indignant medical professional putting me back in my place.  Behave, silly patient!  You don't know anything.

I would feel repressed.  Very repressed.

Monty Python to the rescue again:

Dennis: Come and see the violence inherent in the system. Help! Help! I'm being repressed!
King Arthur: Bloody peasant!
Dennis: Oh, what a giveaway! Did you hear that? Did you hear that, eh? That's what I'm on about! Did you see him repressing me? You saw him, Didn't you? 

And then I would feel like saying:

 French Soldier: I don't want to talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.

I wonder what would have happened if I would have said that out loud?  Oh, it makes me giggle just to think of the reaction.  But I'd still have to pay the bill for the office call.   Of course there are always second opinions:

Sir Galahad: Is there someone else up there we can talk to?
French Soldier: No, now go away or I shall taunt you a second time.

Carl and I would gather up our coconuts and gallop quickly away from the doctor's office.

Sir Robin: Would it help to confuse it if we run away more?
King Arthur: Oh shut up and go and change your armour.

(I apologize to anyone who doesn't know what in the world I'm writing about here, if you've never seen the movie, you're going to be lost, my apologies, but for some reason this movie fits my life so well.  And I did finally manage to be prescribed Armour, ha.)

With any luck I won't end up like this:
 

The Dead Collector: Bring out yer dead.
[a man puts a body on the cart]
Large Man with Dead Body: Here's one.
The Dead Collector: That'll be ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not dead.
The Dead Collector: What?
Large Man with Dead Body: Nothing. There's your ninepence.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not dead.
The Dead Collector: 'Ere, he says he's not dead.
Large Man with Dead Body: Yes he is.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm not.
The Dead Collector: He isn't.
Large Man with Dead Body: Well, he will be soon, he's very ill.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I'm getting better.
Large Man with Dead Body: No you're not, you'll be stone dead in a moment.
The Dead Collector: Well, I can't take him like that. It's against regulations.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I don't want to go on the cart.
Large Man with Dead Body: Oh, don't be such a baby.
The Dead Collector: I can't take him.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I feel fine.
Large Man with Dead Body: Oh, do me a favor.
The Dead Collector: I can't.
Large Man with Dead Body: Well, can you hang around for a couple of minutes? He won't be long.
The Dead Collector: I promised I'd be at the Robinsons'. They've lost nine today.
Large Man with Dead Body: Well, when's your next round?
The Dead Collector: Thursday.
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I think I'll go for a walk.
Large Man with Dead Body: You're not fooling anyone, you know. Isn't there anything you could do?
The Dead Body That Claims It Isn't: I feel happy. I feel happy.
[the Dead Collector glances up and down the street furtively, then silences the Body with his a whack of his club]
Large Man with Dead Body: Ah, thank you very much.
The Dead Collector: Not at all. See you on Thursday.
Large Man with Dead Body: Right. 

The first time I saw 'The Search for the Holy Grail' was years and years ago and I didn't get the humor at all, but now it is my all-time favorite movie.  (What does this say about my life?)

We did manage to work on good ol' Castle Aaargh a little; not as much as we would have if I'd been up to it, but still, progress is progress.

With any luck, if Mandy can piece together what is going on with me, we'll get Castle Aaargh built some day.   I do have high hopes.  Some day soon I hope to have the energy, too. 

King of Swamp Castle: When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England. 

Hopefully, if we do get it built, it won't burn down, fall over and sink into the swamp.

 I don't have enough time to build a fourth one.

Quotes  from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071853/quotes