Is it okay if your therapist thinks you are crazy? My therapist was like in shock when I told her that I had 3 or 4 panic attacks every week. She was aghast. "That's a lot." She said.
But she believed me. She didn't give the look that I usually get from doctors when I describe my symptoms. Though she did say that I had been reading on the internet and stuff, because I knew all the terminology of anxiety.
I described how sometimes I depersonalized in the mirror. That sometimes my hands look small compared to the rest of my body. That my face dissolves when I stare at it.
"Those are massive panic attacks." I was told. In other words she said they were on the extreme side of anxiety. I'm not too certain how much experience my therapist has with such extreme anxiety. I think she expected that I would have panic attacks every few weeks or something like that.
If I had panic attacks only once a week I wouldn't talk to a doctor about it. For Christ's sake I was walking around and standing on my feet all day at work for over a week with a god damned flesh eating virus attacking my system, and it took me until my leg had swollen up so far that I couldn't walk on it before I even visited a clinic.
So there would be no way I would go see a shrink just because I had the occasional debilitating anxiety attack. No. I have those every day. I have several every day. I live with a coat of anxiety attached to me like Food Network TV star Paula Deen had dipped me in buttermilk and dropped me in bread crumbs to fry up some Twinkies in.
I get panic attacks every day baby. I got one right now. I'm convinced that I am septic. I have a low body temp. I have blue hands. Blue hands mean I have low blood pressure, another sign of septic infection. Of course the blue hands came after I took a percocet. I am sure percocets can cause this, though I just looked it up and now I am not sure.
That news has sent me into a near panic. All I can tell myself is that I would be sicker if I had septic, right?
I mean I am not running a fever, my diarrhea is still here but not as bad as a couple of days ago. My breathing is normal, I'm not confused, but I am restless I hardly slept last night.
Again that could just be the anxiety which happens to have the same symptoms of many diseases that are harmful. (kinda fucked up? because it really messes with anxious people like me.)
I'm not feeling much pain either. I hope I'm okay. The death rates for septic are crazy. 15% and higher. That has me really worried.
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| Everything is not all bad. My leg is looking better. Slowly healing up. |
She wants to have another session soon. She did not get to know much about me. We talked the entire session about what I am dealing with right now. She said she'd like to spend the next session finding out more about my background and things.
I feel good about the plan as she set it up for me. Like she is guiding me through a process rather than mearly reacting to certain symptoms that I show her. Unlike how I feel when I go to the ER or to the regular doctor.
I feel like I have to be the one to figure out how to find a neurologist, an internist, etc. And I have to be the one to come up with my health regime. Does anyone else feel like that? Do you feel doctors discount your feelings, symptoms, etc. Even though you are the only person who knows what if feels like when you are healthy and when you feel off or sick?
Doctors are great. Modern Science is a miracle of our own making. But we still need to feel like we have a human connection in order to feel safe.
THE LATEST TRIP TO THE ER
For instance it would have really helped to have my doctor go over my tests with me after he got them back at the ER last time. Tell me what's wrong, or what's good. He just said "most of the tests came back ok." What the fuck does that mean? I got a X-ray, CT scan, (my third in a week) numerous blood cultures, fecal and urine tests.
The doctor didn't even wait for the fecal test to come back before he sent me home. My guess is no one will look it up to see what it is. I have to call or go down there today or tomorrow to find out my results. I am left in limbo. I am still waiting results of blood culture from my primary. No one has called back. It's infuriating to me.
So I sit here and type away trying to ease my fears by writing them down. I have this horrible panic that I am dying. That there is doom right around the corner. I feel like no one understands what it's like to be this terrified all the time.
People want me to just snap out of it. Suck it up. but believe me if were at all possible I would. I hate being like this. I'm really not that kind of attention whore. But sometimes I feel like going to the ER and saying I have chest pains just so I get checked out right away and feel the security that several hovering nurses can give.
One of my nurses recognized me. She said she was going to have to start giving me my own wing or something. It was funny. But scary. I don't want to turn into one of those patients that is seen as a malingerer.
So far, the nurses and doctors have not said that. The nurse told me it was a good idea to comet to the ER when I ran a fever on antibiotics. I was also having chills, nausea, stomach pain. It cost my insurance company more than 3,000.00 for the last visit. My share was over 100 dollars. I can't really afford that.
I paid about half of the cost and I am racking up bills. I have spent 400 dollars this month on medication, doctor and emergency room visits. I have no idea how I can keep up this pace. I am flat broke. My income is shitty. A fourth of my income goes to the crooks that bought my student loans.
What am I going to do in the future? When I get old? How do people pay for surgeries when they make minimum wage? It's disturbing.
I realize I have made bad choices. It's pretty late to turn my life around. So what do we do with people like me? What about people in my situation that have no IQ or have emotional problems or kids? How the hell do we really expect people to take care of themselves?
RISE UP UNDERCLASS, YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS!
The answer is I think we don't. Mostly we let the underclass suffer and die. We don't care because mostly they stick to the barrios and ghettos and mostly they shoot themselves and stick needles in their arms and usually take no for an answer when they stop us in front of Target begging for change.
The only way the rich and upper middle class will ever change, will ever consider giving the underclass a real safety net is when we make it uncomfortable for them.
If you got kids take them shirtless and coughing to marches in front of hospitals and congressmen. Vote. Rise up. General strikes are needed. Take the violence out of Harlem. Show the rich that our social contract is void. That the current situation is untenable. Be DRASTIC!
Otherwise turn on the MMA fights and wait to die.
6 comments:
Hang in there, friend!
I am glad to see that you are fighting entropy... the survival instinct is strong, yes?
You are an inspiration to me, as you chronicle your skid and recovery.
Love yourself. Look how much better your leg looks now that you took action.
Congratulations on getting a therapist you like!
You are absolutely correct in that you need to be in control of your own health care -- and believe me, that's better than letting the "caring" doctors and hospitals be in charge of it.
It sounds like you're doing everything right -- and I'm proud of you for finally taking care of yourself. Next time you're at the hospital ask the social workers what resources you might be eligible for. You're one of the working poor, so there might be a little inch of safety net out there for you.
Thanks for the encouragement guys, It's funny. I actually have to have encouragement to take care of myself. But I feel good that i am finally fighting entropy. I was letting myself slide into a hole that I might not have been able to recover from. That's kinda scary for me that I let it get this far.
Curious. I may be the only skeptic, today, Romius.
No one in the medical profession cares about their patients; they do what is required to make money (if they can make more $$ by ordering tests or prescribing more, they will). Rely upon them at your peril.
For years you've vacillated: self-destructive one month, hyper-health-worried the next. Always intelligently self-aware of your range of behavior, self-absorbed enough to document it in brutal technicolor, and never changing who you are.
Don't smoke, snort, or swallow any more of the things you've done to yourself and exercise occasionally. After six months you will be better. After three years you will be best.
But.
If you do change yourself that drastically, you'll have less to write about. But I like your posts about the underage idols and the terrible customers the best anyway.
Veach your analysis is always spot on. I think I am done with drugs. Though of course I pine for them sometime. I too tire of my hyper health watch, I have had a couple of funny customers and I need to get some of that down. I think in the coming weeks as the anti anxiety meds work and get healthier I will try to write about more interesting topics. But this blog has always documented my current mental state. And as such you are witness now as I lay bare the scars of my hypochondria.
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