I am just so tired.
Right now, in the midst of medical dramas and school dramas and kid dramas and end of year dramas and 14 Christmas trees that need to be decorated and I kinda maybe have a couple more being delivered this week, the thing that is getting me down the most is I am so very tired.
I can push through anything. Torn Achilles? Strap that fucker up and LETS GO. Burst ovarian cysts? Meh, I got shit to do. Frozen shoulder? Pass me a fucking chair to stand on I can still reach it.
But tired? How the fuck to you push through your body encased in cement? STILL motherfucking red eyes rolling around in your head of their own accord.
A brain stuck on buffering.
Simple words just unatainable.
I have been to the doctor numerous times and each time I forget why I am there, what I want to say. So overwhelmed by everything and so fucking tired that I just give up.
MPS has taken to coming to appointments with me, and now, finally, I have a sort of kinda plan of action and waiting for an appointment with a rheumatologist.
And we are shopping for a new mattress tomorrow to hopefully put an end to the screaming pain in my side that leaves me moaning, in a completely unsexy cow giving birth to siamese calves sideways kinda way, all damn night.
And I am trying to accept that afternoons are basically when my body and brain needs to reboot.
I don’t know what I want to get from the rheumatologist, the tentative diagnosis is fibromyalgia probably brought on by the PTSD* and I am in two very fucking slow minds about that.
On one hand it will answer a lot of questions and also mean that I don’t have to worry about pushing myself too hard, that the only consequence is tired and OMG pain and not what I fear the most right now, incapacitation and hospitalisation.
That I will push myself so far that I will snap my shoulder, or my achilles or hip or neck or any of the myriad of places where I have been told I have tendonitis/tendonosis/sore bits, or that headache is actually another stroke, or that pain I feel is my body breaking down YET AGAIN.
That I can just get on with it and not have to worry that I won’t be able to care for Boo.
But on the other hand there is no treatment for fibromyalgia, just a whole lot of suck it up princess and people telling you that you are lazy and a hypochondriac.
And no one wants that shit.
For so long I have been blaming my issues on the strokes, IBS, PCOS, tendonitis, whatever the current diagnosis I have been given and sent on my completely confused and bringing up Dr Google on my phone on the way out the door and generally just being a fucking sooky la la, but what if there is just one all encompassing thing that I can just say THAT is what is wrong with me, not a fucking laundry list of random shit.
Sure, there ARE things that are specific to those diagnosis’s and fuck knows I am collecting that shit like Pokemon, but I am just so tired of making excuses all the time.
Of being broken.
Of being so motherfucking bone tired.
Pushing through concrete.
I want to make plans in the morning and not be a zombie by mid afternoon.
I want to wake up and feel like I actually slept and not with numb hands and hips and cramps in my calves.
I want people to stop being angry with me when I say I will do something and instead, yet again, I am working on the perfect arse imprint on my couch.
I want the old Kelley back, and if that is not possible just someone to tell me that it is OK to TRY and be the old Kelley and that I won’t break myself and jeopardise Boo’s future during my performance.
Oh and a good nights sleep. And the best mattress my dollar fifty can buy.
Do you have fibromyalgia?
Or collect diseases like Pokemon?
Any suggestions for the best mattress to relieve bovine like screaming and skin that is on fire?
*well TECHNICALLY the GP put diagnosis of fibromyalgia on the referral to the rheumatologist but he also put hypertension and I have LOW blood pressure and HAND WROTE ‘stroke’ like a fucking afterthought so WTF do I do with that?
{ 36 comments… read them below or add one }
Jaysus! Slow the fuck down…
My heart is racing just thinking about all these diseases and stuff you have to do. One thing at a time.
Let MPS help out too.
Every day I’m buffering …
& HEY, ya Daft Scots Lass*! I DO help out too! Heaps! Bulk! Lots!
(*hitherto referred to as DSL)
no he doesn’t.
He is a lazy fucker.
OK. I can be that.
Be nice to have a rest …
Hugs, babe. See what the rheumatologist says. He might be a good one. There is hope. Fibro isn’t a great diagnosis but it does explain stuff and managing it will bring improvements.
from what I gather it is the last thing I want. Hopefully the rheumatologist will have some answers.
And a magic pill!
What they said, SLOW DOWN, give yourself a break.
Is it really necessary to add two more Christmas trees? Okay, maybe it is, you are the Queen of Christmas after all, but here’s a tip….don’t UNdecorate them after Christmas. Wrap each one as-is in the biggest plastic garbage bags you can find and store them predecorated for next year. I know in my heart that you won’t do this, but I had to try.
And learn to say “NO” loud and clear when people that aren’t immediate family ask you to do stuff.
It would be nice to get a name to put to all your aches and pains, one diagnosis that covers it all, so you can tell people “I have….”
Christmas trees make me happy.
But I will TRY your suggestion with some of them.
We got a mattress that has the Physio Association logo all over it. I am not sure what it’s called but I was going to the physio and throwing back Large numbers of pills for the pain in my hips. ONE NIGHT on this mattress and I was feeling better. It is pretty soft and wonderful and wasn’t in the crazy expensive aisle. I hope you can get a mattress that helps.
I looked everywhere for one with the physio association on it! There were tons for chiropractors and whatnot. Meh.
So we went with a hugely expensive one and the guy told me to get the 1200 dollar one cause it would be so much better for my pains and overheating.
I fucking ADORE IT! HUZZAH!
I am 100% there with you right now!! As if we had enough doctors get my husbands diabetes wrong in the past 3 years, now he has all sorts of random pains and numbness & all tests say he’s perfectly healthy! So we’ve been on Dr Google to try and find answers & coming up with possible tests to ask for. 100% behind you & know the frustration you’re going through xox
Fuck me dead, how do you get DIABETES wrong?
Day-um. How angry you guys must be.
DR Google can sometimes be right.
Yeah I know…of all the things to get wrong…
Have you tried taking Magnesium? It might help with the cramping (it does for me & helps to relieve muscle soreness and tensing. I like the Swisse brand the best but have to break the tabs in half because they’re huge!)
Also overwhelming tiredness can occur when you start menopause – a blood test can be used to diagnose whether or not you’re menopausal (just to add another dimension to your diagnosis / health issues).
You’re amazing with your dedication to Christmas decorating – I’m flat out getting 1 tree sorted.
I’d forgotten about Magnesium, and how it helps to relax muscles. Tabs work but there are plenty of foods high in magnesium that could be included in the diet as well. Wheat bran and wheat germ; most of the nut family, in particular almonds, cashews, brazil nuts and walnuts; sesame seeds; tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, cabbage, celery and garlic. Ham is also a rich source of magnesium. So a ham and salad sandwich on a regular basis would be a great idea for someone low in magnesium.
No menopause.
Full blood count and not deficient in any vitamins or minerals.
All the foods you mentioned River, I eat at least some every day…
I collect diseases like Pokemon. I have fibromyalgia and arthritis (Ankylosing Spondylitis) and have had for many years. Hydrotherapy helps if you can afford it and have the time. (I can’t and don’t but once did). Physio and chiro can help (ditto). If you get the diagnosis, get your doctor to do an EPC (Enhanced Primary Care) plan, because then you get five free visits to a physio or chiro or whoever you think will help you most paid by medicare, and it can be renewed each year. It’s not much, but it’s a help. Also gentle exercise like stretching helps. I like my latex pillow-top bed, it’s nicer than the expensive one I had before because it kind of molds itself around me, and I use a long body pillow to support myself at night. Good luck, it’s shit but it helps when you know.
I used up my EPC for the physio appointments in July. And the next lot is earmarked (next july!) for psych.
I hope you get some answers.
me too my lovely.
x
When I told my doctor that I was so very tired all the time, forgetful, crabby, and gaining weight like nobody’s business, she immediately suspected hypothyroidism, and indeed it was.
It’s a simple blood test just to rule it out!
Do it!
All the cool people have it!
I was actually HOPING it was that, cause it is just a simple blood test and HUZZAH DIAGNOSIS!
Alas I am borderline HYPER. What the actual fuck?
Sorry to hear about this. My daughter, constantly tired and in pain, just got a diagnosis of a mosquito born disease Barmah Forest Virus. Then there is Ross River Fever which is more severe. I think these are discovered via normal blood tests, so this has likely been ruled out in your case.
Girl, the docs here are hopeless. So no it hasn’t been ruled out.
But I googled it and the symptoms don’t fit anyway.
Hope your poor girl gets better soon! Sounds horrendous.
Magnesium and Green Lipped Mussel tabs help me shitloads.
No, not toshit loads but help me a lot.
Green Lipped Mussel tabs sound nasty.
I’m so sorry to hear that you are so ill and I do hope that they can give you some kind of diagnosis and effective treatment plan. And that’s a brilliant idea to have MPS in on the doctor’s visits. My husband became very ill just over two years ago. I watched him getting worse over time – fever, rashes, numbing fatigue, crushing joint pain, photophobia and disabling headaches. If he was a drink he would have been Cinzano on the rocks without the Cinzano. I sent him to the doctor, who didn’t take him seriously, mainly because hubby forgot most of what I told him to say and just came home saying he needed rest and wasn’t really sick.
Consulting Dr Google, I decided that he might have Lyme Disease (not something you find much in Australia, but it’s a a bacterial infection spread through the bite of the blacklegged tick). I noted his symptoms, compared them to what I read about Lyme and then frog-marched him back to the doctor’s clinic and demanded they do something about it. By this stage he was so ill that he could barely string a sentence together or walk from the bed to the sofa. They sent him by ambulance to the hospital in the next town (yeah, we live in BumfuckNowhere as well) and after doing a spinal tap (not nearly as funny as the movie he assures me) they discovered that his body was riddled with Lyme.
Since then it’s been a long, hard road to semi-recovery. They took so long to diagnose it that some of the symptoms are now chronic and possibly will never get better. And the treatment for Lyme is controversial as well, so it’s been an epic bunfight to get that as well. Luckily I can play the “foreigner card” so they give me what I want just to get rid of me.
My point being that when you yourself feel so bad, you need someone healthy by your side to fight the system for you, as you are too tired to do it yourself. And you risk not getting effective treatment because you haven’t the energy to argue the point with them. Get MPS to read as much as he can about fibromyalgia so you both know what you are up against, what options you have and what questions need to be answered.
oh what a road you have been on!
I am trying to get MPS to read some stuff, even if to just tell me if he thinks I am wrong and it is something else, but he is all ‘you know this stuff’.
I hope your husbands symptoms are relieved with some miracle cure, so wrong that you had to force them to take action. I SO know what that is like.
My Bestie has had all sorts of health issues, one of which included horrid snoring and an inability to breathe at night. This caused many sore muscles and joints until her and her husband invested in a memory foam mattress. They’ve had it for over a year now, but both of them find it so fabulous that they each only sleep with a flat pillow! (they used to have up to 3 each!) After a huge day in the garden or a crappy day at work, she would feel totally stiff and sore. After a nap on her mattress, viola! Aches and pains gone! So there you go. Spend big for big results.
Also, after years of being a a medical coctail for depression, anxiety, blood pressure, iron levels ad everything else. Her new doctor realised that everything had depleted her ability to absorb vitamin D. So now she is taking 4 times the recommended daily requirement and finding that she is actually feeling better and has been able to cut right back on the fizzy drinks and iced coffee that she *needed* to make it through the average day. Just saying 🙂
I have had my D checked and it is all good. But a few years ago Boo’s was so low that he had to take a mixture that was something like 10 times the recommended dose cause it was so low.
Made a HUGE difference to his anxiety. Thanks for the reminder! I shall organise another blood test for him next week x
Kingsdown mattresses are the best. We have one that we purchased right before I got pregnant, I never had the common sleep issues with pregnancy due to this mattress. My husband and I both have severe back pain that this mattress all but clears up. Best purchase ever.
Didn’t see any in the limited stores we have. Ended up with another Sealy and OMG SO GOOD.
Cannot wait to go to bed!
I don’t have what you have BUT I have an auto immune disease and also the bastard osteo arthritis in my knee (lots of ops there ) 3 years in January sinc I had a TKR and it wasn’t a great success and I had a hole in my femur so they removed a third of my leg and put in metal and it sucks,it is not normal it swells and turns into a huge leg by lunchtime and I cant walk very far or for very long and it turns out I am allergic to the metal,but it can not be taken out or I lose my leg!Add to that Arthritis in my feet,neck and hands and another problem with my hand a bone spur and a loose piece of bone and a tendon problem and I get YOU so bad. I too am seeing a rheumatologist next year but I don’t know what they can do for me,I had a cortisone injection and it didn’t work.My advice to you is have a rest in the afternoon a nanna nap if you can and just rest it makes the pain a little better and you will be less tired ,I also meditate as well ,I hope you get some answers hon xx
Oh sweetie, that sucks.
All of it. Sucks. Balls of a donkey.
x
Fibromyalgia was the first diagnosis I got after my legs decided that they didn’t want to work and I was in a world of pain. I got that diagnosis and then was told that I was depressed and all the pain was in my head. I told that rheumatologist where he could go. My second rheumatologist, who literally saved my life, looked at that diagnosis and said ‘all that means is they can’t bother to find out what is wrong with you and causing all that pain’. She actually bothered and thanks to her I can walk again without the use of forearm crutches and I’m pain free (as long as I take my drugs).
I hate the diagnosis of Fibromyalgia. It’s bullshit. All it is means is there is pain and they don’t know what is causing it. Try to make them find out what is causing it.
My doctor told me to stop being stressed for a little while and not to have PTSD.
Cause depression causes fibromyalgia. And I was all ‘no it doesn’t’ and I don’t fucking HAVE depression.
OMG so frustrated. I just want answers. And if it is the bullshit dx of Fibromyalgia then so be it. But I wont accept it until it is the final answer.
So what was YOUR answer then?
x