After over fifteen years of being on multiple psychiatric medications and switching between med after med with short-lived results, I got my psychiatrist's ok to try stopping my lithium, brintellix, seroquel, and trazodone. My depression was the worst it has ever been. I have never been so unbelievably angry. I have never wanted my life to be over so badly. If I could have gotten over the idea of people in my life never forgiving me for ending my suffering I would not be typing this right now. I can't say I'm happy, or even content, but every other thought I have isn't about how I can get out of this life as fast as possible with the least amount of damage to everyone around me. It's baby steps, but I'm back to treading water instead of drowning.
Unfortunately my physical health has been pretty bad. I got sick towards the end January and when I went to the doctor they said it was viral and to just take it easy. I went out of town to return my car to the bank (a story for another time) in the middle of February and I had just been getting increasingly sick so I stayed with Monty and went to the doctor there. They gave me antibiotics, saying that a viral infection shouldn't have lasted that long. I was having chest pain with upper back pain that radiated into my shoulder and up to my jaw, and nausea along with the normal symptoms of upper respiratory and sinus infection. The doctor warned that the pain and nausea could be signs of something cardiac but I said I was fine with just the antibiotics, no need for other tests. I just figured the first doctor should have given me antibiotics and I would be fine. She said that if the symptoms got worse or got bad all the sudden and especially if they came with shortness of breath to come right back in or go to the ER.
The day after I finished the Z-pak antibiotics I was still sick and when I got out of the bathtub I suddenly felt really nauseous, the pain on my left side was intense, and I could barely breath. After I sat with my head between knees for about 20 minutes, I went to the ER. I've always been a hard stick, but apparently I was extremely dehydrated. They were unable to get an IV and tried for over an hour to get blood. They even tried arterial draws and eventually ended up getting blood from my groin using an ultrasound. Long story short they said it was pericarditis (the inflammation of the membrane around the heart). Even longer story short I went back to the doctor a few times, had a few more blood draws, and a urine test. I was given two more rounds of antibiotics and even though my blood work and sinuses have cleared up, I'm still not doing well. I am in a lot of pain.
I'm struggling with the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. I went to my neurologist and asked him to run any test he could think of to see if it could be anything else. The medications that are for fibromyalgia aren't working and other than therapy they say there's nothing else they can do. So far the tests are all normal. There's still a couple of them to come back, the ones for autoimmune and rheumatoid arthritis. I just wish someone would tell me how to make the pain stop.
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