Changing Medications (Level of Trust Required)

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

Drank early morning coffee, this time of the "WTFU" variety with a couple of SToK caffeine/black coffee packs added. Worked for a while. Also took a hydrocodone at around 4:30 a.m. CDT. It's slightly dulled the back/hip/leg pain, but not enough to let me fight through the caffeine to try and sleep.

I think I'm going to take a gas pill and try to eat something light. That should help my stomach accept another cup of coffee (no more SToK—don't want to go into vasospasms, for Christ's sake). I may be throwing away any chance at sleep, but I've got to get rid of this headache.

[mlooney 3,417]

Prof, I really feel for you.  Having a medical procedure done that induced either a migraine or a cluster headache?  That is pretty close to my idea of hell.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

3 hours ago, mlooney said:

Prof, I really feel for you.  Having a medical procedure done that induced either a migraine or a cluster headache?  That is pretty close to my idea of hell.

That's life for me, in a nutshell. Most of my medical procedures seem to go wrong one way or another. That's why I get so damned anxious when a hospital trip is involved.

P.S.—Got a couple of hours of sleep at last, but not without help. What I chose to eat didn't go down well. Had to take a Zofran to get rid of nausea. That knocked me out. Woke up facing a cold cup of coffee. Went ahead and downed it. It helped my spinal headache for a while, but now it's coming back and I'm going to have to lay back down again. Maybe some natural sleep will follow.

[mlooney 3,417]

1 hour ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

Woke up facing a cold cup of coffee. Went ahead and downed it.

See, thats one one you are different than me.  I could never do that.  I loath, hate, and despise cold coffee in any form.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

1 hour ago, mlooney said:

See, thats one one you are different than me.  I could never do that.  I loath, hate, and despise cold coffee in any form.

Necessity is the mother of GIMME BACK THAT DAMN CUP OF COFFEE I SAID PUT IT DOWN RIGHT NOW

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

Sorry for not updating after I got home from the doctor's office. I got hit with a huge pain wave in my leg on the way out of the pharmacy, then started feeling brain freeze when I got home. I wound up passing out for an hour or two.

Let me do a quick roundup first. The doctor I saw today was Spine Team Texas doctor number three—a full-blown back surgeon. Doctor number two did my CT myelogram on Monday (I don't know if he does back operations or what—the field is very segmented, if /me will pardon the pun). Doctor number one did my initial diagnostic injections. He's usually an ambulatory surgeon, if my guess is correct. He's also in charge of pain management, as in the drug dispensation side of pain management.

Ready? Let's begin.

Doctor #3 went over the findings from Monday's CT myelogram. His conclusion was swift and disappointing: there was nothing surgical that he could do for me. Nothing.

We've just begun, and I already want to break something with my cane.

I told him what I've been through—the excruciating pain, the two botched IV attempts (you should see the pictures of them on Mrs. Prof's Facebook page), the possible spinal headache—and I let my disappointment be known. He understood, thankfully. Here's what he laid out for me, not necessarily in any order.

• He told me that I most likely am experiencing a minor spinal headache from the hole they punched during the epidural procedure. The pain has actually gone down a bit today. He explained that's because the epidural hole is healing slowly. His advice: same as the on-call doctor I talked to. Drink caffeine and lie down with my head elevated.
• He consulted with Doctor #1 and got permission to increase my pain medication dosage from every 8 hours (3x a day) to every 6 hours (4x a day). I had to do another urine test and fill out another form with the last times I'd taken some of my other medications, but that was no big deal. Unfortunately, I still had to wait a couple more hours after I got home before I could take the first extra dose. That's why I got hit with the pain wave at the pharmacy.
• He confirmed that Doctor #1 is going to do a procedure on May 16th that should provide some actual pain relief, and not be just another diagnostic like the first two I've been through. Doctor #1 is going to do another epidural, but this time it'll be an injection of steroids. I believe it's going to go through the bottom end of my spinal column, but I'm not 100% sure about that part. I think I'll call and verify that before the procedure takes place.
• Finally, he gave me some material on an electrode implant that is supposed to relieve pain in patients like me with no screamingly obvious physical cause. It came with a disc that I'm supposed to watch. Mrs. Prof read through it while I was doing my drug test (eww), so I haven't had a chance to go over it yet. If the steroid epidural doesn't work, I might wind up getting one of these things implanted. (I shiver at the thought of the word "implanted.")

That's about it. I'm worn out from what I've been through, but starting tomorrow I've got to begin building a forum thread for the literary critique team that I run in the Ubergroup over on Scribophile. I'm going to need more rest before I get going on that. I hope you don't mind if my posts here are short and silly for the next few days.

Thus endeth this chapter. Thank you for letting me write it. Let's see where the next one begins.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

2 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

That's about it. I'm worn out from what I've been through, but starting tomorrow I've got to begin building a forum thread for the literary critique team that I run in the Ubergroup over on Scribophile. I'm going to need more rest before I get going on that. I hope you don't mind if my posts here are short and silly for the next few days.

Thus endeth this chapter. Thank you for letting me write it. Let's see where the next one begins.

Since a large part of the point of this place is to let out steam and to descend into occasional silliness, I don't think anyone will mind.

And once again, you are welcome. I hope the new chapter will also include a new hope.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

11 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

a new hope

/* cue Star Wars opening theme */

[Pharaoh RutinTutin 1,586]

12 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

I hope the new chapter will also include a new hope.

May The Fourth Be With You.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

2 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

May The Fourth Be With You.

I would rather take the fifth, if it wouldn't interfere with so many of my medications. Hell, I'd even settle for The Glenlivet. I'm not that picky.

[CritterKeeper 1,102]

Eh, if you're in too much pain to sleep, too frustrated to settle to work, and/or too groggy to concentrate on anything taxing, there are worse ways to pass the time than a Machete Order marathon....

[mlooney 3,417]

Shrink visit over.  Complete drug change.

Off of Lamictal and paxil, on imipramine, ablify, and restoril.  Also told "don't be stupid, take the addrerall."

[The Old Hack 2,448]

44 minutes ago, mlooney said:

Shrink visit over.  Complete drug change.

Off of Lamictal and paxil, on imipramine, ablify, and restoril.  Also told "don't be stupid, take the addrerall."

Ouch. That sounds like a rough time ahead. I hope the new set will work better.

[mlooney 3,417]

26 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

Ouch. That sounds like a rough time ahead. I hope the new set will work better.

Because my cheap, "we don't use insurance but are still cheaper than most Plan D places" pharmacy was out of one drug I needed for the change over I start the change Friday night.  The only possible issue is after 3 days when I am off of Lamictal I might have a seizure even though I'm not taking it for seizures.  I'll keep you posted.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

1 minute ago, mlooney said:

Because my cheap, "we don't use insurance but are still cheaper than most Plan D places" pharmacy was out of one drug I needed for the change over I start the change Friday night.  The only possible issue is after 3 days when I am off of Lamictal I might have a seizure even though I'm not taking it for seizures.  I'll keep you posted.

Please do. I'd appreciate it.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

Having problems with a rather fast, throbbing heartbeat at the moment as I wait for my nightly pills to kick in. Took my BP & heart rate: 130/76 and 108 b.p.m. Not bad on the BP, but rapid on the heart rate. Lots of PVCs, too. Not helping with my epidural headache at all.

Something's making it hard to keep both eyes on the same spot, too. Could be my hydrocodone.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

10 minutes ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

Having problems with a rather fast, throbbing heartbeat at the moment as I wait for my nightly pills to kick in. Took my BP & heart rate: 130/76 and 108 b.p.m. Not bad on the BP, but rapid on the heart rate. Lots of PVCs, too. Not helping with my epidural headache at all.

Something's making it hard to keep both eyes on the same spot, too. Could be my hydrocodone.

That doesn't sound pleasant. Please be careful.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

Back down to 116/79 bp, but with 99 bpm as my heart rate. The PVCs have let up, but my headache hasn't. I'm going to get some more caffeine (after midnight? Sure, why not?) for the epidural headache and see if that'll help. I'll try to sleep once the headache calms down.

Man, why can't hydrocodone work on epidural headaches? Too many drugs that work on just one thing and not another.

[mlooney 3,417]

3 minutes ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

I'm going to get some more caffeine (after midnight? Sure, why not?) for the epidural headache and see if that'll help.

It's been my experience that if the choice is a weird sleep cycle or a headache, well as I've said before normal sleep cycles are for chumps.  :-)

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

43 minutes ago, mlooney said:

It's been my experience that if the choice is a weird sleep cycle or a headache, well as I've said before normal sleep cycles are for chumps.  :-)

You speak truth. I'm stuck watching Men In Black II while I wait for the caffeine from the jasmine oolong tea I just drank to kick in.

[mlooney 3,417]

Yesterday when I was buying my Adderall I thought about the fact that I needed to get some pseudoephedrine.  Then I thought, no I buying legal speed.  Let's not buy the primary ingredient for meth at the same time.  The pharmacy technician was looking at me when I picked up the tag for the pseudoephedrine.  I suspect I avoided them running the state database for pseudoephedrine buyers, which takes about 5 minutes.

As it happens I found another box of real Sudafed in my big cabinet of drug bottles, so I should be ok for several months. 

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

I got an e-mail from the hospital's patient portal, telling me that I had new test results in my online chart. I logged in to check them and discovered that they were from Monday's CT myelogram. Surprisingly enough, they listed three major problems found during the exam:

• Lumbar nerve root disorder
• Lumbosacral spondylosis with radiculopathy
• Other spondylosis with radiculopathy, lumbar region

There are more detailed reports for both the myelogram and the CT scan that show a bunch of other little individual problems along parts of the spine. Sounds like someone hasn't been giving me all of the details.

Now, the problems listed above and in the detailed reports may not be operable or curable, but they at least sound like issues that could be the sources for my pain. I'm not even 100% certain of what they are, although "nerve root disorder" sure sounds like an explanation for some of what's going on.

And here I was, thinking I was going crazy from some hip problem or even a psychosomatic disorder. Damned "Spine Team" doctors weren't telling me everything that they were seeing. I need to do some more digging, methinks.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,308]

On 5/3/2017 at 8:51 PM, ProfessorTomoe said:

He confirmed that Doctor #1 is going to do a procedure on May 16th that should provide some actual pain relief, and not be just another diagnostic like the first two I've been through. Doctor #1 is going to do another epidural, but this time it'll be an injection of steroids. I believe it's going to go through the bottom end of my spinal column, but I'm not 100% sure about that part. I think I'll call and verify that before the procedure takes place.

I finally got confirmation of the name of the procedure a few minutes ago. It'll be a lumbar caudal injection, done on May 16th. I'll have to go off my "stop list" medications again for 48 hours before and 24 hours after the procedure, with the exception of my Abilify (which I'll have to taper off again for a couple of days prior to that). Jeez, what a pain to go through just to find out about it.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

Just now, ProfessorTomoe said:

I finally got confirmation of the name of the procedure a few minutes ago. It'll be a lumbar caudal injection, done on May 16th. I'll have to go off my "stop list" medications again for 48 hours before and 24 hours after the procedure, with the exception of my Abilify (which I'll have to taper off again for a couple of days prior to that). Jeez, what a pain to go through just to find out about it.

*sigh* You'll make it through this one, too. I have faith in you and Mrs. Prof. But yeah, it would be nice if the blows would let up a little.

[mlooney 3,417]

@ProfessorTomoe your issues with Abilify make me want to set several calendar alerts on several machines to make sure I don't run out of it.  In theory I start on it today.