Side effects again

When I was quitting Lyrica, my doctor put me on Cymbalta. It does not work on its full effect yet but the pain has eased remarkably and I have the feeling that I have less foggy days or moments too. Now I am on full dose of Cymbalta (for a week already) and I am wondering if I am having one of those side effects again... they will go by in three months, said my doctor... so.... if I can make up my mind on whether it is a side effect or not.... then I have to make up my mind on whether I can stand it out for three months... or whether it is safe to wait for so long...

I feel very undecisive. I am also starting to feel like an outsider. I feel like withdrawing from everything, and when I do, I end up blaming myself of not being there with others or for others, not taking part, not doing this or that... I am like questioning my own value all the time, and doing things I don't approve of. I also feel I am too dependent on other people and their doings and sayings and I don't want to be like that so I withdraw even more, to prove myself that I don't care.

I also react very strongly to things which I would normally let pass and not care. I was deeply hurt by being rejected by a moslem because of my faith. We had good conversations until the moment when he realized that I was a believing Christian to whom faith meant really a lot. Things like this happen, this is not the first time, and he was by no means anything special. The difference is that now I react really unreasonably and feel deeply hurt. - I also had an agreement with a friend of mine to meet her. Foggy as I am, I had made the first appointment with her on my husband's 50th birthday so I had to cancel it. Now I could not go this week either because I have hurt my back and I am on sick leave - besides, even the day was wrong because it was the day when we have our Arabic lessons, as my husband kindly reminded me. I cannot control these flops although I do my best because if I am foggy, I am and I cannot perform faultfree. And how could I know I would hurt my back right now? Now she told me we can as well meet next year, she is tired and she has problems at work.... she is like that, she has been like that all the time - and I understand I have hurt her - okey, she has hurt me too. I feel rejected because of my illness. And it hurts really a lot. But of course I am rejected by it all the time and I should not care - people are like that, and I know I am difficult, canceling appointments and things like that. I think I will be trying to avoid all kinds of appointments - which will make me even more isolated and feeling an outsider.

Some part of my mind tells me this is perhaps a warning signal on that the medication I am taking now is causing depressive thinking and that it is not healthy. I feel it important to write down how I feel and what I think about it, so that if I need to consult a doctor, I can explain the problem to her.
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I have here in between been reading about Cymbalta, and the experiences people have had. The side effects are said to be strongest in tghe beginning, especially self-destructive thoughts (which to me seem to mean that feeling of isolation and of an outsider) but in the end it has turned the opposite though not with everybody... I don't know if I am any wiser. I will wait and see and pray this goes by and I will be back to normal again.

Quitting Lyrica

Today, I have taken the last tablet of Lyrica. From tomorrow, I am off that medicine! It feels good, really really good! It almost took my life but the status of asthma has stabilized now - although it is not yet perfectly good (it takes time) but it is so much better anyway! It feels like a triumph to finally be in this state! My last day on Lyrica, woooow!!!!

It has been a slow process, quitting that medication, as it has been reduced by and by. Pain is back but usually not too bad to tolerate, and anyway I have been able to use quite strong pain killers that do not trigger asthma. They are not very many though or so it seems. One which was very good resulted in more than one doctor telling me that it can cause heart attacks, so I quitted that too.

What is bothering me most these days is fibro fog - I have it to some extend almost every day and it seems to be somewhere between me and the world. And the other thing that bothers is stiffness. Otherwise I am so much better than before..

I have been in a really bad state due to medication. I hope and pray I don't need to wittness anything like that anymore.

An angry and human medical experiment "rabbit"

I feel like a rabbit in medical experiments. I am really really frustrated. All else is in control but pain is ruining my life, my health, whatever. Last drop has been this experiment with Lyrica. It was about to take my life. I have been suffering for an entire year about severe consequences which we now think have been a complication caused by this medicine. Some of them have been listed in the "official" side effects but some are surprising. Anyway I am the one who takes it all, it is my body they are messing up, it is me..... indeed me..... who am now struggling with everything I have to fix after that..... I am so angry.... I am so frustrated.... This disease has robbed me of my self-control and my dignity... it has made me submit to all these tests and all experimenting with medication.... it has made me take life-threatening meds because in the end, when it gets really bad, I cannot take it and I don't really care much what the relief is only it comes. I had to do something and I have no boxing bag to deal with my aggressions, so I have been screaming... really screaming aloud when I came home, and then I started to make a collage about my ekg... a perfectly healthy one but also that, and x-rays, and heaven knows what more, were taken to find out if I had heart failure... I cannot describe my feelings.... good of course that nothing is wrong and a real miracle that I have even managed to heal from something here in between, while all this mess has been going on in my body... ohhhhh shit I hate this all, I really do....

Cymbalta

Cymbalta is now tried on side of Lyrica which has been reduced and will be cut off completely.

Life with Cymbalta is not easy either. I was checking the list of side effects to see how many of my new oddities are explained by the known side effects of Cymbalta.

Not few. Or what do you think:

*Headache. (I have had that sort of almost incontinuous head ache which I have never had before. This feels very sharp, completely different from before.)

*Tiredness, problems sleeping, bad quaqlity of sleeping. I can sleep 2 - 3 hours per night.

*Added yawning. (Of course, because I don't sleep enough. I don't feel sleepy but even so, I have today been yawning my jaws off.)

*Feeling sick. Yep. 7 kg gone just like that. This side effect I could even keep since thanks to Lyrica, I have a lot to lose in weight.

*Tinnitus. I have it even from before, it is continuous and never stops for a second but now I hear it much louder than before.

*Eczem. It seems I have nothing in my stomach skin other than scarves from pregnancies and a very thin skin but i have been scratching it like a maniac since it feels so itchy - and now applying body lotions too.

*Cold fingers and toes. Yep. Definitely.

*Cold sweat.

*Shaky muscles. Today I felt my legs would not carry me. It went by pretty soon but anyway... not a nice feeling.

And all this I have now, when I am taking the minimum dose. What if it gets doubled, because it is not working at its fullest now? Will it add on the effect of the side effects too?

And what if there is no medication? What if there is pain and no medication?

Celecoxib has helped tame the overflow of pain when the basic medication has not been enough, but I stopped taking it when my asthma doctor told me it has caused heart attacks.

About asthma, my asthma doctor was satisfied that I had found the reason for the worsening symptoms and had been able to prove and eliminate them. Now I can move again, which has not been the case for long since I ahve been suffocating.

On Friday and Saturday I have been out, walking, gardening... I must go on with it, it is something I can do to my burn out symptoms, to prevent them.

I have a dream. I want to get rid of medication. Perhaps not overnight but anyway. I don't want to constantly worry about side effects and safety. During the past one year or so I have quitted three medicines that have been life-threatening - to me, or to someone else. Lyrica was life-threatening to me because of asthma. The two others have been drawn out of market.

But I should also remain able to work, live and love as normally as possible. And I am NOT willing to start trying all kinds of possible aids and healings the world and market is full of. It would be an endless trying and disappointing, like it has been with medication. But there is a jungle of all kinds of healers and products, aiming to profit from the need to make life tolerable.

I feel more than confused. But so far, I have a dream at least.

Getting rid of Lyrica

Lyrica did not suit me. I have asthma and it caused asthma symptoms to get so much worse that I had to start cutting down on Lyrica. Lyrica was helpful though, as long as it lasted. It hit where the pain was, although not even that could completely free me from pain - but life was so much easier - as long as it was just that. Now I have been cutting down, first from 2 x 300 mg to 2 x 150 mg, and again from that to 2 x 75 mg and now that amount is not helping so much anymore. Asthma symptoms have easened remarkably, and I feel really a lot better. But I am 20 kg heavier than I was before Lyrica - though I am now putting off weight, the first 4 kg is gone which feels good but is not nearly enough. I think though that the more I cut down on Lyrica - and the next move, after a month maybe, will perhaps be getting totally rid of it - the more I find the natural feel of how much I need to eat, and following what I feel makes me put off weight. So far it has been that easy. That natural feeling was completely confused with Lyrica.

Was to see my doctor this week. She wanted to have a cardiologist consultation, so I made an appointment - but it will be just in the middle of October. Other than worrying herself about my heart and being horrified of the weight gain (for reason, true - I am too) she sent me to routine blood tests due to diabetes. There really is a mix of health issues to deal with. I am seeing the asthma specialist on Sept. 30th. I sometimes wish all those specialists would once sit together round the table but no - I am going with all the information from one to another.

My doctor also wanted to try Cymbalta, but I am now at first using 2 x 75 mg Lyrica to get used to the reduced amount of it before taking the first minimun dose of Cymbalta. That is because I don't remember if she told me to do so or not, so I'd like to make sure no harm is done. I hate trying new meds. I feel scared when I read in the leaflet that it may cause suicidal thoughts and tendency to suicide. I am not the least suicidal or depressed or anything but I was once on medication that was then drawn from the market due to causing suicidal behavior, and I stopped using it at once - and first then realized that I had had day dreams of just walking till I get away from this all... what this all? There is really nothing to complain with my life, other than being ill this way and that way. So getting those thoughts is scary. What if I'd have used the med longer? Thanks God I was not.

Cymbalta is affecting the central nervous system, like Lyrica is too. It is mostly used for diabetics to help in neuropathic pain caused by diabetes. As far as I know, I don't have neuropathic pain yet. Anyway it has proved to be effective in helping some fibromyalgia patients with their fibro pain too. It is NOT known to worsen asthma symptoms.

I wonder if anyone has experiences of life, and fibromyalgia, with Cymbalta? I'd like to know how it has felt, and how it has worked.

Living with a disease which is placed in the central nervous system is scary. The disease in itself is scary because it can do so much harm and cause such immense pain although it does not actually destroy muscles or joints. What is even more scary is the effect it has on brain gray mass (diminishes it) and the awful moments of fibro fog, or SMOG like someone said. But also using meds that affect the central nervous system is scary. And once you start something, it takes TIME to cut down on it. It does not make you dependent, at least Lyrica did not, I just cut it down after instructions and there are no feelings of wanting to have it back or not coping... the only thing it causes is added pain of course, and stiffness which is as bad.

Trying to minimize the amount of medicine I take daily, especially those that affect the central nervous system, I asked my doctor if I could use just 10 mg amitriptyline instead of 25 mg and she agreed. The health insurance does not pay for this "smaller" pill which sounds funny. It did pay for 25 mg pill.

I have to observe myself closely when starting with the new med, Cymbalta. Usually the side effects in me increase gradually and are obvious first after a longer period of use, which makes observing a demanding task.

Flare days

Severe, difficult, extremely painful flare days, one after another. This morning it feels that the pain killers together with a weak dose of Lyrica ease the pain to some extend but not completely. On the other hand, I did not try to get dressed before 10 am., and I am doing no exercising either. I'd need excercising for diabetes and weight loss but life is eternal balancing. These days excercising just makes me feel so much worse that I cannot believe I profit anything from it. There was a time when I went through very thorough and heavy exams all over my body and functions due to severe blood cell production problem. No fault was found, no cancer, nothing. My doctor's opinion was that the pains I felt messed up everything. It all normalized when I could use Lyrica and it helped to eliminate, or ease, the pain (because it was not completely away all the time). Now the pain is back and I am afraid it will all start all over again. I cannot use the maximum dose of Lyrica anymore because it makes asthma get much worse. When I have halved the dose now it probably helps, I don't know - anyway the feelings of pain that are left are enough to make me call it severe, burning, rough, desperate, whatever. I tolerate it because I have no alternative. Otherwise I'd call it unbearable.

Raining

It is the second day with reduced Lyrica. It is raining. That is a bad combination because both reducing Lyrica and raining add on the pain that I feel. What is more, it is so dark that it is probably going to rain the entire day.

I have slept badly, waking up every hour. That is still something to make me even more achy.

Morning was a bit uncomfortable so that when I woke up at 7 (my daughter needs her first insulin of the day at that time) and took my medication - added with Paracetamol to help in the pain (useless, I know it from before!) - usually the most wonderful thing to do that I know about is to creep back in between the sheets and wait that meds do their work. Now however asthma symptoms are worst in the morning too so although they are not as bad as they have been, they are not completely away either, and that made me feel really uncomfortable. I had to get out of bed and so here I am, making my life's complaint. With too long sentences, I know. This morning I just can't think short. I am also mistyping, so it seems.

Writing seems to feel weary too.

Breathing

I have been living serious times, health-wise. Like some of you know, I am a multi-conditioned one, having more than one life companions (I mean chronic diseases). I am all the time balancing between them. The one that has become a major cause of trouble and a cause of increasing worry has for the last months been asthma, steadily getting worse all the time. These last weeks I have been in a state where I have not known if I will wake up the next morning anymore or not. Several times I have been woken up from a state where I have not been breathing anymore. It has been frightening. I have not been able to climb up stairs without an asthma attack. I have not been able to do practically anything without an asthma attack. And the past few weeks, I have had an ever-increasing feeling thet the attack medication is not biting any more.

I found out Lyrica, which I have successfully taken for another chronic life companion, fibromyalgia, can cause broblems in breathing, and can actually seriously worsen asthma symptoms. Not for everyone, but for some. - If you don't know fibromyalgia, it is a nasty but not life-threatening disease which among other things keeps your muscles stiff, causing you sometimes even unable to move, and still worse, it keeps you in constant, serious, all-over pain. Lyrica helped me, like it helped many others. It did ruin my diet and cause a colossal weight gain but I thought it still did more help than damage. Many others have also been complaining of colossal weight gain when starting to take Lyrica.

There was a time, a few weeks back, when I was taking steroids - yet another time! - for asthma symptoms that had gone really bad. I was getting more and more - and more - swollen, and counghing my lugns out. I felt that steroids would soon kill me in that swollenness, that I would suffocate of it if then asthma would not make the same before that. I stopped taking steroids and started to feel a bit better but something was still seriously wrong. I could not walk, even slowly, and talk at the same time, for instance.

Then yesterday evening I had had enough of it all and I took only 150 mg Lyrica, instead of the full 300 mg dose. I did not sleep very well. This morning I took another 150 mg, instead of 300mg. And you guess it - I can breathe. I can climb stairs and I do cough but I dont get an asthma attack. I would not consider climbing up and down the stairs yet but perhaps I will do that too.

I have a devilish head-ache, my feet are burning and I have a tingling pain in every joint. After a major shock caused by my daughter who had a lamp fall on her and got her hands bleeding and then we had to treat her shock and pain first and the scars then - my legs deceived me and I had to drink sugar for shock symptoms myself, and go to bed. But otherwise the day has been a wonderful one because I have been able to breathe again.

All is well as long as you can take breathing for granted. I have not been able to do so for a very long time. I cannot tell how good it feels to be able to inhale and outhale without problems!

Hosting a dinner party

Hosting a dinner party

I enjoyed so much today. We were hosting our daughter's 11th-anniversary-party for her friends, and after that, a dinner party for our family and friends who came to celebrate her with us. I enjoyed planning the menu and in which order to prepare dishes; I enjoyed planning the use of china and other table ware; I enjoyed counting glasses and washing them in beforehand so that they would be shining in the table. Most of all I enjoyed the thought of hosting a several-generation dinner party for really many people - after such a long pause! I did not succeed in making the dishes taste exactly as I'd have liked them to... but I did everything I had planned doing and I am satisfied for that. I have been awake since 5 a.m. today and worked almost all the time. This will be the third night when I have returned in using double dose of the dark hormone and it is starting to bite. I have hardly any pains though it is storming and I have been on my feet all day. I tried to quit taking that hormone since I realized that I could fall asleep without it - but I slept really poorly anyway, and became so achy that it was nearest intolerable. After the vernissage in the museum my feet were so sore that I was ready to scream all the way home (while driving). At home, I could only creep between the sheets and go to sleep - after having taken all pain killers, Lyrica AND the hormone. Next day was better and this day has been enjoyable (is NOT equivalent to pain free but way to that direcytion anyway!)

All the reason to be happy!