Getting Through the Mid-Day Slump

MMMmmmmmMMMMmmmm...
Image Courtesy of: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I know a lot of you out there self-medicate like me with chocolate, sweets, coffee, tea or even cigarettes to get you through the mid-day slump. Thankfully I don't smoke!

Today I can't have any caffeine, so I'm going crazy. I'll be the first one to admit that I have a caffeine problem. It's how I live my life and without it I feel completely lost. I'm really having a hard time keeping my eye balls open! haha But I must persevere. Normally at this time, depending upon what time I woke up, I would have a small cup of tea or coffee. Then at around 4PM, I lay down for about 45 minutes and then force myself to get up.

I thought well I could make something tasty to eat, but there is nothing exciting in our house at the moment. With both of us being sick for a week with the flu, a lot of our produce went bad! Our refrigerator was soo stinky once my sense of smell came back. I had to throw out a lot of food, so now we are really really low.

The place where I normally have my blood work done at, were unable to draw the IGF-1. So...I had to go to the hospital to get it done. /sigh They are doing a lot of construction up there, so the lab has been "closed". I showed up there and saw a lot of people considering it was "closed". The lady there, although she was very very nice, she obviously doesn't deal with many patients with small veins. I told her you have to tighten the band as tight as possible making it pinch my skin. She just kept telling me that that's not how they are trained and that she is not allowed to keep the band on longer than 1 minute. She kept saying the words patient comfort blah blah blah. I just kept telling her it won't work because my veins are small and in the end you'll make me uncomfortable with all the jabs.

Well after 2 jabs she tells me that they are trained not to jab more than twice and to make the 2nd one work. After 2 jabs patient comfort goes way down...No crap! During all of this, she randomly says to me, "How are you doing?" and in a tiny, high pitched voice, I let out a "OK".

To get all 4 vials, I was squeezing my fist as tight as possible and I convinced her to leave the band on. Thank goodness. The last vial took a long time to fill and we only needed 4. I've gone in to those places needing 9 vials with no problems at all. Obviously her following the rules didn't work out too well with me. It took her breaking them to get the blood out of me.

Sadly, I'm probably going to have to see her to get the renin and ACTH drawn. I still have to call the lab to see if they can do those in the outpatient center. My God, I hope so. I can't stand going to the hospital and that lady really was not that good. The women at the outpatient center are incredible. I haven't had a bad experience yet...Though I shouldn't speak too soon.

Caffeine Dependent--Adrenals?

I have noticed these past 2-3 days, I have been very dependent upon caffeine and sweets. I have always liked a cup of coffee in the morning, but the sweets thing is new. I don't know where this is coming from! Part of me thinks it's my adrenals acting up again. Tomorrow I am going to slowly start back on the cortef. 5mg in the morning and 5mg at lunch or maybe at 4pm. I haven't completely decided yet. I need to get on a better eating schedule. It's messing me up more, I know it.

In addition to that, I am going to start back up on my supplements. The itching has almost completely stopped. Now I get to add stuff back in 1 at a time to see if any of them were causing it.

My one cat is sick with a UTI and she has been keeping me up at night. I get worried about her. She likes to pee on stuff when she has one...UGH...That's her way of letting me know she needs to go to the vet.

Here's a quick picture of her. We found her almost literally on our doorstep one night coming home from the store. She was meowing like crazy and looked very sick with cuts all over her face and a chunk of an ear missing. Java (nicknamed Bean) has been with us for more than a year, but she has her own health problems with food allergies, chronic UTI's and digging at her fur. I love her with all my heart though. She was obviously thrown out by someone in the area (probably because of her health problems). I saw her two days prior in our back yard. Just thought she was another farm cat passing through.
And so I'm not showing bias to cats. This is my other cat, Lily. I love her so much too. Each of them have their own quirks.Lily is really weird and likes thing that are poisonous to her. Cats are supposed to hate citrus fruits, but if you are eating a orange with her in the room, SHE BEGS for the orange peel...Weird I know. She also LOVES red romaine lettuce! Not the green stuff, it has to be the red! haha

No quick fixing: Feel horrible

Yet another day without any sweets, caffeine or packaged foods. I have had to take 2 naps today because I simply could not keep my eyes open any longer.

I so desperately wanted some coffee, but I did not give in. The 2 naps today are very weird even for me and I wonder if I am catching some type of virus because my neck is hurting and my throat feels a little scratchy. If it's not one thing it's always another. That's life, right?

I have started to chart my temperature averages and it's been 98.2 for 4 days now. Now looking at what Dr. Rind says that means I have a thyroid problem and not an adrenal problem, but clearly my saliva tests shows that my adrenals are not working properly. I don't have any symptoms of thyroid problems and have almost all the symptoms of Addison's Disease.



I am holding off on trying any type of herbal formulas until I can get my aldosterone and renin tested. Those 2 are very important in order to find out where the problem lies. Those tests will help to pinpoint whether this is an actual adrenal gland problem or a pituitary gland problem.

My Vicious Cycle

There is one thing that I really hate about having adrenal fatigue and it's the vicious cycle I find myself in every day. I feel horrible and my body craves something with caffeine or sweet. When I eat it, I actually feel better for 3-4 hours to only crash the next day even worse. Without that quick fix though, I usually have to take 2-3 hour naps a day and even after the nap I feel just about as tired as I did when I went to sleep. BLAH. It makes me so frustrated with myself that I think it's causing its own stress and emotional problems. As a result, for 3 days I am vowing to not eat any packaged foods, no caffeine, and no sweets. It's not going to be too tough because my husband is with me on this one.

For the next 3 days, I will be feeling like crap. I can't wait!